


your best means i've won

by larryhaylik



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Crushes, Homophobia, Inner Demons and all that, M/M, Mental Health Issues, World Figure Skating Championships, getting better, suggestions of an underage relationship - it's just a crush but read end notes just to be safe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-30
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 22,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21616357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/larryhaylik/pseuds/larryhaylik
Summary: Yuri wasn't sure what exactly he had wanted here, but it sure as hell wasn't this.He didn't want some Japanese god-knows-who to be sitting in the bathroom he was just about to use for his own emotional breakdown. He didn't want to be having an emotional breakdown in the first place but sometimes you just couldn't help it.Making it into the Grand Prix Final was undeniably thrilling and skyrocketing to the first place after the short program felt like Yuri was standing on the top of the world. He had been excited, nervous, proud, terrified and so, so ready for the next part of the competition.But the free skate. It all went wrong even before that, but the free skate gave it a damn crown.Yuri could scream a bloody murder and be justified because there was a murder - Yuri Plisetsky had died today, on that ice. His big Senior debut, shattered, in less than four minutes.It was supposed to be Yuri's big debut, but it fell apart as quickly as his personal life. Enter Viktor, a therapist with a bunch of his own demons.
Relationships: Phichit Chulanont/Yuri Plisetsky, Victor Nikiforov & Yuri Plisetsky
Comments: 3
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> To give you a semblance of how long this bunch of words took me to write: the skating season used here is 2017/2018. I think this is the longest I've ever written anything and I'm so glad it'll be off my to-do list.
> 
> This includes Russian words/phrases/place names. The meaning should be easy to figure out from the context, but there's a list of translations in the end notes, just in case.
> 
> Tags and characters will be updated.
> 
> Also, no clue what I meant by that title. If you have an idea, let me know.
> 
> Enjoy some YoI universe while we're on the indefinite break.

Yuri wasn't sure what exactly he had wanted here, but it sure as hell wasn't this.

He didn't want some Japanese god-knows-who to be sitting - crying - in the bathroom he was just about to use for his own emotional breakdown. He didn't want to be having an emotional breakdown in the first place but sometimes you just couldn't help it.

Making it into the Grand Prix Final was undeniably thrilling, especially for a Senior debutant, and skyrocketing to the first place after the short program felt like Yuri was standing on the top of the world, his skates in one hand, glass of champagne in the other, smiling wickedly down on everyone else. He had been excited, nervous, proud, terrified and so, so ready for the next part of the competition.

But the free skate. It all went wrong even before that, but the free skate gave it a damn crown.

Yuri could scream a bloody murder and be justified because there was a murder - Yuri Plisetsky had died today, on that ice. His big Senior debut, shattered, in less than four minutes.

And in less than four seconds, he was going to start bawling his bloody eyes out, as unappealing as that sounded to the left-behind scraps of his confidence, so he needed that sobbing snotty kid out of this bathroom _now_.

So Yuri might've yelled some rather unlovely things, but who cares. Yuri certainly didn't. The Japanese kid scurried away like a spooked kitty.

Yuri leaned against the bathroom door to make sure no one walked in on his misery like he had had on that boy's, and let the tears flow.

"Yuri Plisetsky!"

Yuri's head slowly turned after the voice. He didn't bother with quick responses lately; when people called him, they usually did so in order to express their pity on the outcome of his debut and assure him that next year would be better.

Every time that happened, Yuri was _this_ much closer to burning his skates and moving to Burma.

It wasn't like anything was tethering him to Sankt Peterburg anymore. There was nothing left for him - nichevo.

Moving to Burma actually sounded nice.

Not skating anymore actually sounded nice.

Yakov was walking his way.

And he wasn't alone.

"Yuri," Yakov started, something strange glinting in his eyes. Yuri wasn't sure he liked it. "This is-"

"Viktor Nikiforov. Priyatno poznakomitsya," the silver-haired stranger said, extending his hand. The name sounded vaguely familiar, but Yuri couldn't place it - or he couldn't make himself care enough to place it. It was almost the same thing these days.

"Yuri Plisetsky," Yuri replied, ignoring the offered hand until Yakov glared at him. "Nice to meet you, too," he added as they shook hands.

Viktor's grip was strong which was something Yuri could appreciate.

"Viktor here is my friend and he will be helping with your training."

Yuri's eyebrow slowly rose up.

"Why?"

"You have talent, Yuri, and I think Viktor is well-suited to help you make the most of it," Yakov said. "I can make your technical score perfect, and presentation, but I can't - sufficiently help with..." Yakov looked suddenly uncomfortable. Which was funny because if anyone had the right to look uncomfortable, it was Yuri.

"Yes?" Yuri pushed.

"With what's going on in your head."

Yuri felt like he flubbed a jump, the ice disappeared from beneath his feet and he slammed into the barrier. He had expected a lot of things, but he didn't expect Yakov to hand him over to a _shrink_.

It wasn't like he could blame him, though. Yuri's motivation flagged considerably and most days, stepping into the rink was as hard as getting out of bed. He had no desire to repeat the Grand Prix Final.

He could still see the shocked and disappointed faces of the audience, hear the murmuring and polite clapping when the scores appeared, and feel the empty seat across the stadium burn a hole into his back.

"Yakov-"

"Yuri," Yakov started again, softer. From a corner of his eye, Yuri saw Viktor look away as if to give them some semblance of privacy. "You are one of the best students I have ever had, and it would be terrible to see you miss the rest of the season because of one misstep. Viktor can help with that. And skating, too, if you let him."

"I'm not sure I want to compete anymore."

Yuri let the statement hang in the air and it wrapped around the three of them like a blanket that blocked out all the other sounds of the rink.

"Yuri-"

"If I may," Viktor interrupted with a small smile that seemed somewhat wary to Yuri. "Could I talk to Yuri alone for a minute?"

Yakov seemed as if he would resist at first, but then Viktor gave him a long look and Yakov deflated, nodded and left.

"Are you going to give me a pep talk?" Yuri asked tiredly.

"No, actually. I was about to say that you should stop skating if you really want to."

"What?" Yuri stared at the man in front of him in bewilderment.

"But before you make that decision, I just want to ask two questions - and I'd like honest answers. Can you promise me that?"

Pre-GPF Yuri would immediately scowl _sure as hell no, I don't owe you anything_, but Viktor's eyes were like an open book and Yuri couldn't read any ulterior motives, so he nodded.

"What's skating?"

"Shto?"

"What's skating, Yuri?"

Yuri looked towards the ice where Mila just jumped into the air gracefully and landed a perfect triple Salchow. Behind her, Georgi went from slow, seemingly pointless gliding to a sit-spin as naturally as a hawk broke from circling to pursuit.

"It's the closest you can be to flying."

Yuri would really like to know whether he had always had a poetic bone somewhere in his body or whether it just magically appeared when he was being asked pointless questions. Either way, Viktor hummed and leaned his elbows on the rink barrier.

"Would you step onto the ice for me?"

"Shto?"

"I can't tell whether you actually mishear me every time or if you just like the sound of my voice." Viktor turned to Yuri, a smile on his lips and sparks in his eyes.

"Uh," Yuri said intelligently, taking off the protections of his skates. Stepping onto the ice was probably the most familiar feeling in his emotive repertoire and he pushed forward as easily as others walked, breathing in deep. He glanced to Viktor for directions, but the other man just smiled, so Yuri circled the rink, jumped a single toe and stopped with a screech right in front of him.

"I don't really know you and you don't really know me," Viktor said, a strange expression on his face, "but if it means anything to you, it looks like you're home on the ice."

"Spasibo. I guess," Yuri murmured.

"And I think you'd regret it if you left now. Actually, I'm sure."

"What makes you think that? What do you even know about me, about figure skating?"

Viktor smiled.

"More than you think, about both. But that's not the point. Time for the second question. What will you have left if you stop skating?"

Yuri froze. A part of him wanted to punch Viktor in the face because how dare he speak like that out loud. The other part curled into a ball and desperately tried not to start sobbing.

As the only child and a figure skating hope of Russia, Yuri hadn't exactly had time to make friends or explore other potential hobbies and ways of life. He had lost both parents in a car crash under circumstances he'd rather not pick apart, and his dyedushka Nikolay, despite all the love and support he used to show Yuri, was currently off the table as well.

"That's what I thought," Viktor said quietly, pale eyes flicking across Yuri's face. "Yuri, I have known Yakov for years and he has never spoken about one of his students as highly as he speaks of you. Sure, he keeps complaining about all the hair he has torn out because of you," Viktor grinned, "but he's really proud of you, too. If you decided to keep skating, he would help you with everything he has. And so would I."

Viktor fixed him with a gaze that held way more heat than Yuri would've anticipated

Yuri stared at the man in front of him, a man he had barely met, and wondered who would be helping whom in this arrangement - Yuri had issues and he knew that. But it seemed that Viktor had some of his own, just as unresolved.

Yuri left the rink exhausted, body and soul bleeding. Yakov had put him through his paces. The Grand Prix might've been behind him but as far as anyone was concerned, Yuri Plisetsky had qualified for the European Championship in January and thereby had no time to spare. A month is a short time.

It was bitter, bitter cold outside the stadium, Russian winter at its December worst. Yuri burrowed deeper into his scarf and kicked a stone on the sidewalk. It jumped forward and stilled, and Yuri kicked it again. _Funny_, Yuri thought, shaking his head. _It's like me and another me. I'm pushing myself on even though I don't actually want to go on._

Yuri kicked harder. The stone tumbled off the bridge and skidded across the frozen surface of the Neva River

_And here goes me again. That's exactly what I looked like, ten times over, when I fell on my ass during the GPF._

A body collided with his and Yuri landed - not gracefully at all - on his ass and yelped.

"Watch where you're going," a man barked out, stepping over Yuri without a second glance.

"Fairy," a second man added after giving Yuri a once-over, and the way he spat the words assured Yuri that the guy wasn't a fan of figure skating and thereby wouldn't be using fairy in connotation with his skill on the ice.

Picking himself up, Yuri hissed at the twinge of pain. Bruised tailbone. Tomorrow's practice was going to be a bitch.

"You're not supposed to be here," Yuri announced the next day when he stepped out of the changing rooms and saw Viktor gazing out over the ice. The words startled the man and he snapped around.

"You see, people usually start conversations with a zdrastvuyte," Viktor said, leaning back on the rink barrier. "I'm just here to observe."

"Can you even skate?" Yuri asked bluntly as he entered the rink, skating out. His tailbone protested loudly, and Yuri grimaced.

Viktor laughed out loud.

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I can."

"Then why don't you get out here?"

"I will when I feel like it. As for now, I think I'll stay here."

Shrugging, Yuri turned his back to Viktor and started the warm-up. He had hoped to be alone for a bit; that was why he came in an hour early.

Well, technically he came in early because he had woken up at 3am from a vivid replay of the GPF, couldn't fall back asleep and so decided to use his time more constructively.

He was tired all the way down to his bones but as he moved, the screeching of metal on ice filling the air, he forgot all about Viktor. Not long after, all about himself, too. He became a force, an element, a wind, swirling, circling, unseizable.

Then he jumped, remembered, just a flash of his grandfather's face, and fell, hitting the ice with a sickening clarity of mind.

Just like in the GPF, old memories resurfaced, filling his head with static, breaking his concentration.

Plus the tailbone. Can't forget that.

Yuri rolled over to his back and took a deep breath. The ceiling of Yubileyny was a familiar sight by that point and the biting cold from beneath him felt like coming home.

At least somewhere felt like home, Yuri thought bitterly. Viktor was right yesterday. Yuri would be nothing without skating. But right now, Yuri felt like nothing even with skating.

"Yuri?"

Ah. Speaking of Viktor.

"Don't worry, I'm getting up."

Yuri put his hands beneath him and pushed off. To his surprise, he found Viktor standing just a meter or so off, shoes on his feet, a weirdly pained look on his face. Weirdly, as if in "not the usual cringe of someone who had never had the misfortune to crack down on rock hard water".

"You shouldn't be out here with these on," Yuri said, swiping off bits of ice off his legs. "Yakov would kick you if he saw you wearing shoes on his ice."

"I know, but you weren't getting up, so I just wanted to-"

"-check up on me? No need. I've hit the ice more times than I can count, a little stumble like that won't kill me." Physically, Yuri stopped himself from adding.

"You never know. I can't have you dying on me on my second day." It was supposed to come out ironically, Yuri guessed, but somehow Viktor didn't pull it off.

"I wanted to talk to you, actually," Viktor continued, suddenly more cheery. "We're supposed to meet tomorrow morning."

Yuri's stomach squeezed nervously. He did not like people prying into his head, even if they were as good-looking as Viktor.

"Yeah?" Yuri managed. It was probably the eyes, Yuri's brain suggested. Or maybe the hair. He looked like winter made a person. Yuri hoped none of those thoughts showed on his face because although Viktor seemed like an easy-going, friendly, comfortable-with-everything kind of person, Yuri got burnt before. Better safe than sorry.

"I was wondering whether you'd like to move it to today afternoon, you know, after practice. You could sleep in tomorrow that way."

Tempting. Having to carry on functioning after practice sounded horrible, but not having to wake up felt like a Christmas present come a month early.

"Yeah, could do," Yuri said. "Kagda? Gde?"

"At four, just outside Yubileyny?"

"Works for me."

They stared at each other and it seemed like Viktor was gathering the courage to say something, but then-

"Vitya! No shoes on my rink!"

Viktor gave him an apologetic smile.

"See you at four."

And he carefully returned to the proper solid ground. Yuri's eyes followed him and once again, he had a feeling he'd seen the man before.

They did meet at four outside Yubileyny. Yuri had been psyching himself up for the session all through the post-practice stretch, shower, and changing, and now he was basically shaking with self-induced nerves.

Meet the Junior World Champion everybody.

Viktor led him through the streets of Sankt Peterburg with the confidence of someone who knew the city inside out - someone who's lived there for years.

Which was funny since Viktor had arrived from Moskva, as far as Yuri knew.

Viktor chatted mindlessly, basically not taking a single breath in fifteen minutes. It seemed he was one of those people who couldn't deal with silence.

"Have you been in Sankt Peterburg before?" Yuri asked, cutting through the fourth story about Yuri-forgot-his-name. Kristof?

"Yeah," Viktor answered lightly. "Anyway, then we-"

"How long?"

"How long what?"

"How long have you spent here?" Yuri wasn't sure why it mattered, but it seemed to him that if he was supposed to talk to Viktor openly, he was entitled to some information as well.

"Not too long." And if that wasn't an evasive answer, Yuri didn't know what was.

"Viktor."

_"Yuri." _

"Davai."

"Three years."

"That is long. What were you do-"

"Here we are," Viktor interrupted him, opening the door of a small café.

"A café? I thought this was, you know," Yuri flushed, and he whispered, "for the head stuff."

So what. He didn't want to talk about it.

"'Head stuff'," Viktor scoffed, picking a table and unwinding his scarf. "I'm not gonna push you into an office, sit you on a leather armchair and drag things out of you."

"Too professional for you?"

"I beg your pardon, I'm as professional as they come."

There wasn't a single professional hair on Viktor's body as far as Yuri was concerned, but then again, he hadn't seen them all, had he?

Yuri shook his head and took a seat opposite Viktor.

"Where do you live?" Viktor asked, eyes scanning the menu. Yuri's fingers drummed a nervous beat against the wood.

"With Yakov."

"Good. It won't be a long way home for you then," Viktor looked up with a smile. "I'm getting a latté."

"Aren't you gonna ask why?"

That was what people usually did when Yuri told them about the nature of his accommodation. First, they were just startled, then they wondered why, and, if left unsteered, came to the conclusion there was some sort of abuse involved and got concerned.

And if they found out Yuri was parent-less, they got _really_ concerned.

"Do you want me to?" Viktor startled Yuri out of his musing.

"Well," Yuri said, picking on the tablecloth, "not really."

"But?"

"I expected it. For the, you know-" Yuri made a wild gesture with his hands, "head stuff."

Viktor's lips thinned and then he burst out laughing.

"Could you please not call it that? Just call it a session. Sounds like practice."

Viktor's eyes crinkled when he laughed.

"Why, then?"

"Why what?"

"Why do you live with Yakov? I thought it was just the my-best-of-the-best extra-training-with-Lilia thing, but you make it sound like something different."

Viktor's eyes were also scarily unwavering when he wanted something.

"I lost my parents some time back," Yuri began. He might as well since he had brought this upon himself. "And I can't live with my grandfather anymore. So Yakov took me in until I'm eighteen and can get my own flat."

"What was your dyedushka like?"

"Is," Yuri corrected, "he's still alive."

Viktor gave him an indecipherable look. "What is he like, then?"

"He was like my stand-in parent. Supported me with skating, baked pirozhki, got me a cat." Yuri smiled at that. It was one of his best memories, the late summer afternoon when dyedushka Kolya had just turned up from work with a kitten in his bag.

"He sounds amazing."

"He is." He really, really was. Yuri missed him so much.

"What happened?"

"We argued."

"People argue all the time."

"It was special." They had never yelled at each other like that before. Leo, Yuri's cat, got so scared Yuri had to lure her from under the bed for solid twenty minutes.

It hadn't helped that he was in a rush to leave and crying his eyes out.

They were quiet for a while, Viktor studying Yuri's expression like Yakov studied Yuri's jumps.

The waitress came, took their orders. Yuri wished he could get a shot of vodka, but he was, unfortunately, both underage and a sportsman, so tea it was.

"Was that before the Final?" Viktor quipped almost tentatively.

"Yeah."

"Wanna tell me about it?"

"No."

"Okay."

The waitress brought their orders and Yuri thankfully wrapped his hands around the too-hot cup. The burn felt good.

He tended to push that conversation far, far into the deep end of his mind because having it floating around meant too many painful memories resurfaced. He tried to push it away now, but wetness pressed into the corners of his eyes like a fist and he couldn't stay.

"Excuse me for a minute," Yuri muttered as he quickly slid out of his chair and bolted towards the bathroom.

Locking the door and checking the lock for a good measure, Yuri found himself in a situation so similar to the GPF it made him laugh a little. In a bathroom. About to cry.

He couldn't though. Viktor would know.

_You can wait_, Yuri told himself firmly, gripping the edges of the sink. _Just an hour and you can go home and cry your heart out. Just wait._

Yuri took a deep breath. Splashed his face with water, dried off and went back.

Viktor was sipping his latté, looking out of the window like a magazine model and here it was again - that spark of recognition.

"Ty v poryadke?" Viktor asked when he spotted Yuri.

"Yeah, I'm okay." Yuri took a sip of his tea. "Is it possible I know you from somewhere?"

"We haven't met before," Viktor replied easily, but it seemed to Yuri his face paled a little.

"Yeah, but were you, like, a child actor, or something?" Yuri pushed. Making Viktor talk about himself meant they weren't talking about Yuri which currently felt like the best way to avoid tears.

"Surely not. Although I would've made an excellent actor." Viktor grinned widely and Yuri had to agree with him. Anyone who could dance around questions like Viktor would be a great pretender.

"I can Google you, you know." Yuri tossed the words into the air like a ball and watched as it hit Viktor in the face.

"That would be unfair," Viktor tried, but his voice sounded off. "I can't Google you."

"I won't stop you from trying."

"That's not what I meant. I'd just much rather get everything from your point of view and paint the picture myself."

"Does that mean you'd like me to do the same?"

"I'd certainly appreciate it," Viktor smiled tightly.

"Can we make a deal then?" Yuri asked, leaning forward when Viktor gave him a questioning look. "One bit of information for one bit of information. And I'll promise not to Google and you won't ask around."

Viktor smiled.

"Sounds fair. We've got-" he checked his phone, "-three minutes. Fire away."

Yuri's mind started spinning so fast.

"How old are you?" he asked so quickly he almost stumbled over his tongue, and Viktor laughed.

"I must admit I did not expect you to start with something quite so deep. Twenty-eight."

Twelve years difference, although that didn't feel like much. If they were dating- Yuri shouldn't think like that. The middle-aged couple two tables over was already giving Viktor and him sharp looks.

"What's your cat called?" Viktor asked, and Yuri snorted.

"I must admit I didn't expect you to start with something so deep," he parroted, a smile still on his face. "Leo. Do you have pets?"

"No. I've always wanted a poodle, though. Have you finished high school?"

"Not yet. I got held back because I'm constantly away or training. I'd like to finish Attestat by next year. Are you really a therapist?"

"Yes," Viktor said, affronted, "I'll have you know I've got a degree in Psychology with a focus on sport, training and exercise. How did you get into skating?"

"Mama took me when I was five. I loved it and wouldn't let it go and eventually, they signed me up for classes. Yakov found me a couple of years later. Why did you pick the focus on sport?"

"Because I wanted to understand-" the sentence got cut off abruptly as if Viktor decided not to finish it in the last second "-it. Sport. I wanted to know what's behind the performance."

Yuri was completely sure that was not it and just opened his mouth when-

"And that's it," Viktor said, his smile back in place, if a bit shaky. The clock on his phone said 17:16 - a minute too late.

"Right," Yuri murmured. Until next time, then.

Yuri kept his word and refrained from running Viktor's name through search engines. He was still sure, however, that he had seen both Viktor's name and face before.

They kept having their sessions, twice a week in this or that café or, if the weather wasn't a complete nightmare, while they walked around Sankt Peterburg. Yuri had visited more interesting and intriguing spots than he had in the past five years.

From scraps of information given to him through the one-for-one rule (now accommodated to include a story for a story), Yuri managed to piece together a somewhat coherent picture of Viktor's life. He now knew Viktor had been born and spent the first fifteen years of his life in Moskva, then three years in Sankt Peterburg. What was he doing, he wouldn't say. Around eighteen, something must have happened, because Viktor had left Russia and got into a university in Italy where he got his degrees - and met that guy Christophe Yuri had heard of before, who was apparently Viktor's best friend.

Then he had returned to Moskva, worked as an assistant in a therapy and consulting surgery and then he heard Yakov was looking for someone to attend to a young sportsman, applied, and got it. The end.

Yuri couldn't count all the holes and unclarities in that story if he tried, but whenever he got near the topic, Viktor either deflected or flat-out refused to tell him. Even if it went against the rule.

Which, fair enough, they'd only known each other for a month, but it did make Yuri want to leave Viktor's questions unanswered as well. The problem was, Yuri could feel his crush on Viktor developing by the second and there was little to nothing he was able to withhold from the older man when he stared at him with those terrifyingly blue eyes.

They were just passing the Saint Issacs’s Cathedral when the topic fell onto Yuri's grandfather again.

"Why don't you live with your dyedushka anymore?" Viktor asked, looking up at the ornate entrance of the cathedral with a hand above his eyes to shield himself from the rare winter sun.

"I told you, we argued."

"And I told you, people argue all the time. What was so special about this one?"

Yuri stayed silent, watching a little girl throw a piece of a pryanik to the pigeons.

Could Yuri trust Viktor? Could he tell him? After all, Viktor did seem like a reasonable person. He'd lived in many places, befriended different kinds of people, he studied psychology, for God's sake, he knew there was nothing Yuri could do.

"I came out to him," Yuri says, eyes trained on the little girl. The birds immediately flocked on the bit of food like ravenous beasts, scaring her.

"I met someone at the first Grand Prix this season. I liked him, he liked me, and we both got into the final."

With a squeak, she jumped back, turning to a middle-aged man to grip his hand and hide behind his leg.

"We planned to meet afterwards, so I told dyedushka that morning that I wouldn't be going home with him. He asked where I was going, just to check, like all parents and guardians do."

The man crouched down to talk to the little girl, calming her. He said something and she smiled.

"I care about dyedushka very much and I knew he cared about me, I didn't want to lie, so I - I told him."

Yuri drew in a deep breath. The coldness of the air should have stung, but everything in Yuri felt numb.

"I guess he didn't care about me as much as I had believed."

The man picked up the girl, twirled her around, and she squealed in delight as the pigeons fluttered away. They walked away hand in hand.

When Yuri chanced a look at Viktor, he found the other man still staring at the cathedral's entrance.

The day after, Yuri went to see Yakov.

"I'll finish the season," Yuri said, not bothering to sit down.

"Okay," Yakov replied warily, sensing Yuri wasn't done yet.

"I can't promise the next one."

They stared at each other and for a crazy, mad second, Yuri thought he saw wetness lining Yakov's eyes; but that was nonsense. Yakov rarely smiled and never cried.

"I do hope you'll change your mind," Yakov said, voice steady, "but in case you don't, I suppose it's my job to get you to your absolute best for the Worlds."

Having Viktor around was actually more like having a friend than a therapist. They hung around, they talked, Viktor often came to watch Yuri and the others train, following their movements with wistful, and sometimes critical expression.

Yuri stopped in front of Viktor, blades screeching on the ice.

"Okay, shto?"

Viktor looked at him in confusion.

"What do you mean?"

"You keep making this-" Yuri gestured wildly, "this face, like you want to say something, but you don't. So, shto? Spit it out."

"Georgi never straightens his left leg properly in the spread eagle. Mila needs to pay more attention to the step sequence pacing and your take-off on the quad Salchow is not balanced correctly."

The words left Viktor like a long held-back waterfall, and Yuri gaped.

"How do you even-"

"I told you," Viktor said simply. "I know how to skate."

"Yeah. But this isn't beginners’ stuff," Yuri pressed. "What you just said is more Yakov-level stuff. I don't-"

"Then don't," Viktor said curtly, suddenly defensive.

"Right." Yuri stared at the man for a moment before skating away to continue training, but he wondered. Those observations were on details, he noted later, after watching both Mila and Georgi like a hawk. It took a trained eye to notice such small things. Viktor would have to either adore skating to the point of obsession to find them, or he was- or he was a skater himself.

Yuri missed a step and almost went sprawling. Turning to Viktor, he traced the man's figure and recounted his backstory in a new light. Viktor did move very gracefully. He rarely lost balance and when he walked, he almost danced. And he knew Sankt Peterburg very well and he spent several years here, doing Yuri-knew-not-what. It would make sense.

Yuri would like to say that the discovery - or 'discovery', more like, since he was short on any kind of evidence - tempered his curiosity about Viktor, but honestly, it raised more questions than it answered. If Viktor really had been a skater before - and if his precise knowledge meant he was good one, like Yuri suspected - why would he leave the skating scene? Viktor was 28 now - skaters only just retired at this age.

In any case, Yuri thought as he tried to figure out where the balance issue in his quad salchow was, he will get the answers eventually.

December rolled on. Yuri witnessed half the world celebrating Christmas through Instagram as he walked to Yubileyny to train. He enjoyed the snow outside, the white frozen expanse of the Neva river, warm café sessions with Viktor along the Nevskiy Prospekt. Viktor quickly became a staple in Yuri's life and sometimes it honestly scared Yuri to see how excited he was about meeting the other man.

The New Year's celebration was a quiet affair. Yuri kind of played Harry Potter and stayed quietly in his room even as he heard Yakov and Lilia and several of their coach friends toasting the New Year several times. Although he very much tried not to, he couldn't help but miss dyedushka Nikolay.

It only got worse as the 7th of January approached. Rozhdestvo and Christmas had one thing in common, a universal fact - it meant family time. And through the ads in the TV, through scrolling down Instagram, through overhearing other people's conversations about their holiday plans, Yuri was constantly reminded of what he was going to miss. He couldn't really help the effect it had on him - to his ever-growing frustration, he stumbled and tripped during his routines more and more often.

That's because if he were feeling unstable inside, Viktor pointed out as they sat in the Bushe Bakery by the Winter Palace, he couldn't really expect to keep his balance on the outside.

"When does it go away?" Yuri asked quietly, swirling the spoon in his cup of tea.

"I know you want a concrete time," Viktor replied, giving him a soft smile, "but there's really no telling."

Four days before Rozhdestvo, Yuri woke up feeling sick to his stomach and just barely made it to the bathroom before the little of what was left of his dinner came right out. The intensity and violence of it left him weak and shaking, and it took several minutes before he trusted his legs to carry him back to bed - it was just 5am. It was too early.

It was the day dyedushka always brought the yolka home and they would spend the evening carefully hanging the decorations on the branches, trailing fir needles all over the flat.

Two days before Rozhdestvo, Yuri had his last official pre-holiday training followed by a session with Viktor. The day was surprisingly bright and so they got take-away coffees and wandered around the decorated streets and markets, playing their now established game.

"Are you going home for Rozhdestvo?" Yuri asked, inspecting the stall's collection of knitted hats.

"No," Viktor replied shortly, picking up a hat shaped like a moose and trying it on. Yuri snorted loudly when the right antler flopped and smacked Viktor in the face. "Do you feel ready for the European Championship?"

"No," Yuri said equally shortly. "What will you do, then?"

"Get a whole lot of bliny from Teremok and eat them all by myself."

"You're going to stuff yourself with fast-food pancakes on Rozhdestvo?"

"Indeed." Viktor sipped his coffee with a content smile. "Why are you worried about the championship?"

"What if it's a flop again?"

"Why would it be?"

"Davai, you've seen me these past two weeks. I'm skating like a baby deer."

Viktor grinned at that.

"Not funny," Yuri mumbled into his cup. Viktor stayed quiet for a moment.

"I don't think it's going to be a flop."

"Why not?"

"Because even if you're feeling down, you always have that protective fire in you," Viktor said slowly. "I think you'll defend your pride to the last and do your best."

"Last time I did my best I ended up being so far from the podium I might as well have been in a different country."

"It won't be about the medals this time."

"What is it going to be about, then?"

"I'll tell you when it's over."

On the day of Rozhdestvo, Yuri woke up as sharply and cleanly as a mirror breaking. Fat snowflakes swirled outside the window, making the world look as soft as kitten's fur. Sitting cross-legged on his duvets, Yuri felt surprisingly numb. After the emotional mess of the past fortnight, he had expected something, well, worse. Tears, some more vomiting, maybe he would scream into his pillow again?

Not this time, it would seem. This time, the world was quiet and quaint, turning slowly, and for the first time since he had moved out (ran from) his dyedushka's flat, Yuri felt like he was turning slowly, too.

He went through the day without a smile, almost without a word. Yakov seemed a little worried, cautiously shooting Yuri quick glances, but when he suggested Yuri call Viktor, Lilia raised one perfect eyebrow and dragged Yakov into the kitchen. They spoke in hushed voices for several minutes and when they came out, Yakov's expression was tense but he didn't say another word. And Yuri - Yuri didn't care. The numbness filled him snugly, leaving no space for anything else. In a way, it was comforting.

The mention of Viktor had, however, sowed a seed into Yuri's mind and later, he remembered Viktor saying he wouldn't be going home for Rozhdestvo. Was he alone then? Or did he have friends to spend the holidays with?

It was early evening, just after the dinner, when Yuri's brain broke through the fog and he found himself holding his phone, Viktor's name in the recipient's details, thumbs hovering above the screen.

_Hey! How are you? I just thought I'd wish you-_

Shaking his head, Yuri held the delete button. Those words didn't even sound like him.

_Hi, how's Rozhdestvo? Hope you're having-_

Not that, either.

_Hey, I hope you're enjoying the holiday! I miss you-_

Yuri stared at the screen, dumbfounded to see what his brain-to-fingers filter should've caught but didn't. He surely couldn't say that to Viktor, but he couldn't find it in himself to deny it. Now that the words were out, he could feel the squeezing force of missing someone constricting his breathing, and it surprised him because that sensation was usually reserved for his dyedushka.

Yuri pressed delete again.

_S Rozhdestvom, Viktor._

Sent.

Ping!

_Merry Christmas to you too._

The first day back on the ice was terrifying. Yuri's limbs were acting as if they had nothing to do with the rest of his body, his brain's motor centre most of all. He must've looked like an octopus stuck in a whirlpool, everything flailing in different directions regardless of Yuri's efforts. Yakov yelled himself nearly hoarse trying to rein him in but it didn't do much. Mila came after the training to ask if he was okay, to which he hissed - because otherwise he would've sobbed it - 'Kaneshno, why wouldn't I be,' and then quickly left the stadium.

Stepping out into the cold, Yuri didn't know what to do. He didn't want to go back home, he didn't want to stay in Yubileyny, he didn't want to just wander around. The traffic was running past him, people milled around, it was loud, so loud, loud ringing resonated through his head-

The church.

Yuri had never been particularly religious, not when he had gone to a few services with his parents as a child and definitely not now when he felt like an intruder in the house of God.

He didn't know where else to go.

Quickly walking through the underground tunnel to cross the street, he then almost sprinted towards the church entrance. Carefully, he pressed the handle and let himself in.

The church was nearly empty, save for a couple of elderly ladies with dusters and cleaning cloths. The air smelled strongly of incense and it was warm enough for Yuri to immediately start sweating beneath his layers of winter clothes. There were pews to the right, and he went to them, sitting down and taking his coat off.

He had never been here, despite it standing a stone's throw away from Yubileyny. Everything was a heady glittering combination of blue and gold. Little angels and extensive decorating lined the walls where there wasn't a picture of Jesus or the saints. Candles burned in glass bowls. It was so calm. It was so blissfully quiet.

Yuri felt a tear slide down his cheek, instantly wiping it away. He wasn't going to cry. He wasn't.

Another tear made its way down, then another and eventually, Yuri stopped deluding himself and let them flow.

Somebody sat down next to him. Yuri spared them a quick glance and let out an embarrassing, choked-off sound when he found Viktor smiling reassuringly, understandingly, at him. Yuri would be ashamed of it later, but in that moment, he just scooted closer, laid his head on Viktor's shoulder and cried until he couldn't anymore.

Needless to say, Yuri felt better after crying. As if the water washed away the battling emotions and anxiety, his training went much better. Viktor mentioned Yuri's breakdown only once:

"Do you want to tell me?"

They were sitting in the top row of Yubileyny, Yuri too exhausted to walk anywhere for the session.

"You know you could just ask me to tell you. It's within the game rules."

"It is," Viktor mused, watching a group of ten-year-olds begin their warm-up.

The silence went on until Yuri realised Viktor wasn't going to say anything else.

"I-" Yuri began, words immediately failing him. How do you encompass that kind of helplessness in words? "It just became too much. And then it crumbled down. I crumbled down."

"Any idea why?"

"You were at the practice that day," Yuri almost snarled, defensive. "You know why."

"Tell me."

"Because I sucked, alright!" Yuri snapped, his voice echoing through the mostly empty arena, and several kids looked up to them. "I sucked so much Yakov screamed himself silent, which never happens, and I was sure I was going to suck equally as much at the Europeans!"

"You _were_ sure?" Viktor inquired, completely unaffected by Yuri's raised voice. "You're not anymore?"

Yuri's mouth clicked shut.

"Well," Yuri followed up after a moment, "no. It helped. Crying helped."

Viktor hummed, a small smile playing on his lips.

"You being there helped."

Yuri held his breath as the words left him, a sinking feeling in his stomach, hands clutching each other.

"It felt - safer, in a way, with you there. And... yeah. Spasibo."

"You don't have to thank me. I'm supposed to be there for you when you need me. I'm glad to be of assistance," Viktor smiled easily.

It felt like a punch to Yuri, even though he wasn't sure why. It was Viktor's job to help him. If it weren't for Yuri's incapability to deal with his problems, Viktor wouldn't even be here.

"Right," Yuri mumbled.

"When do you leave for the Europeans?" Viktor asked suddenly, turning to Yuri.

"Short program is Wednesday afternoon, so we'll leave for Moskva on Monday. Yakov says it's best to have some space even though it's just a few hours away." Then Viktor's words dawned on Yuri. "Wait - are you not coming?"

"I wasn't invited for the ride, no."

"Oh."

Yuri didn't realise how much he relied on Viktor being there until now. But it also made sense - Viktor was supposed to help him with the stress and, and insecurity, and dear Lord, what if Yuri fell apart again-

"Yuri, breathe."

Viktor's hands were suddenly on Yuri's shoulders, grasping hard enough to break Yuri out of the cycle. His breathing was still laboured, though, verging on painful.

"I'm okay," Yuri gasped, calming his heartbeat, feeling his blood rushing to his face in embarrassment. He did it again - just completely overreacted.

"You're not overreacting," Viktor said sternly and Yuri gulped, not having realised he was talking out loud. "You're just stressed, which is expected, and tired because you've been pushing yourself too hard all day." Viktor sighed. "Come on up. I'm going to walk you home."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tagged underage for the crush Yuri has on Viktor in the beginning. There are a few parts describing Yuri's attraction, but there's nothing physical and the crush will disappear soon.
> 
> Russian words used:  
Sankt Peterburg - Saint Petersburg  
Yubileyny - Yubileyny Stadium in Saint Petersburg  
nichevo - nothing  
kagda - when  
gde - where  
shto - what  
Ty v poryadke? - Are you okay?  
Moskva - Moscow  
Priyatno poznakomitsya. - Nice to meet you.  
spasibo - thank you  
Rozhdestvo - kinda like Christmas, except in January  
Teremok - a Russian fast-food chain  
bliny - pancakes kind of a thing  
S Rozhdestvom. - Merry Christmas.  
Nevskiy Prospekt - the Nevsky Avenue in St Petersburg  
kaneshno - of course
> 
>   
Next part coming next week. Please leave feedback, it helps a lot!  
Find me on [tumblr](http://www.larryhaylik.tumblr.com).


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Russian translations in the end notes.

Monday came bright and brisk. Yuri was glumly pondering where all the time had gone as he boarded the plane to Moskva, Yakov waving him to his window seat.

Yuri wandered over and settled down as comfortably as you could when your head felt like a well-shaken bottle of Coke and your insides seemed to have developed an interest in break dancing. It wasn't even competition nerves, not the usual kind. For the first time in his skating career, Yuri wasn't worried about points or medals; he was worried for himself.

Looking back at the Grand Prix Final and the ensuing crisis, Yuri could see how much he had broken down then. Skating was his life. And because of one fluked competition, he was willing - no, _ready_ \- to throw away a decade of work, no reasoning, no thinking. Now, two months later, he recognised it would have been unfair not only to Yakov and the rest of the team, but also to himself. He almost didn't give himself a chance to try again, to redeem himself, in a way. And now, on his way to Moskva for the European Championship, the fear that he was going to blow everything up and not carry on afterwards cut deep into his skin.

He still remembered the polite clapping and Yakov's bewilderment, remembered the hollow feeling in his chest and the way the ground had seemed to be swaying from beneath him whether he stood, sat or skated. How many times can you fall down this well and crawl your way back up?

"You're shaking."

Yuri looked up from where he was sitting on his mat, stretching. An olive-skinned guy with violet eyes stood next to him, a water bottle in one hand, a phone in the other.

"What?"

"You're shaking," he said, pointing his finger at Yuri's hands.

Yuri's eyes followed. Even as his hands gripped the soles of his feet, the quivering was still visible. He tightened his hold.

"So what?"

"So nothing. Just wondering if you're sure you should be out there today."

Yuri could feel the blood drain from his face first, then return full-force as he flushed in embarrassment.

"None of your business, asshole."

The guy raised his hands in surrender.

"I'm just saying. If you're not well, you shouldn't be on the ice. I'm going after you and I don't want any blood on it."

With that, he turned around and walked away, leaving Yuri gaping at his back, hands shaking harder. He curled them into fists, gripping as tightly as they'd go, then released them. The tremor didn't disappear, and he could feel the panic rising up his throat, clogging his nose until he gasped for breath.

Scrambling up, Yuri staggered towards the bathrooms. A few people gave him looks of concern but they turned to pity as soon as they realised who he was. Where the lights always this bright? He threw the door open and promptly threw up into the closest toilet, spasms radiating from his belly.

He crumbled down onto the floor once his stomach decided it was done. Breathing heavily, eyes closed, Yuri wondered how the hell he was supposed to walk out and skate. All he wanted was his bed, a cheese and potato pirozhok and a cup of tea.

And Viktor.

He really, really wanted Viktor.

The feeling filled him up, resonated in his bones, and Yuri was a little angry at himself, honestly, because he was sixteen, not six; he ought to be able to battle his demons alone. 

At the same time, though, he would give a whole lot of things to have Viktor here because Viktor believed Yuri could do this; could step on the ice and show the world his best. Yuri took a deep breath. 

If Viktor thought Yuri could do it, then he could do it.

He couldn't do it.

The Czech skater was just wrapping up his short program. Yuri had maybe two more minutes before the girls picked up all the flowers and he was called up. 

Everything in him felt tight, stretched too thin, but at the same time he felt pressed together, like his skin was shrinking, squeezing him inwards. Standing just behind the curtain, Yuri peeked out. The skater was taking bows, waving to the cheering crowd. They adored him. Yuri choked and ducked back. He was not going to step out there, he thought as he hurried down the hall, unsteady on his skates. He couldn't take it, all the eyes, all the attention focused on him, the journalists snapping pictures, hoping for another headline of his failure, and his dyedushka not here, not cheering him on - was he even watching? Did he even know Yuri was skating today? Did he care?

"Yuri."

There was a hand on his shoulder, gripping tightly, and he whipped around.

"Yakov, I can't-"

"Here," Yakov interrupted, pushing a phone into his hand.

"What-"

"Talk," Yakov muttered, pushing him unceremoniously back the way he came. Yuri raised the phone to his ear.

"Allo?" 

"Yuri."

Yuri's whole body sighed in relief.

"Viktor. I- I don't think I can do this."

"Of course you can. I promise you can."

"That's a big promise to make," Yuri mumbled as they neared the curtain behind which the ice waited.

"I'm willing to make it. But I think I'll have to break a different one."

"Which one is that?" 

They walked through the curtain. A bouquet fell apart on the ice and they were cleaning it up. Precious seconds to spare.

"Remember when I told you this competition wasn't going to be about medals? We were on the Christmas market. You asked what it was going to be about and I promised to tell you when it was over."

Just before Rozhdestvo, as they had wandered around the streets with coffee in their hands, admiring the handicrafts.

"I remember," Yuri whispered. The cleaning was done.

"The goal here isn't for you to win. It's not a piece of precious metal being hung around your neck."

"What is it, then?" They called out his name. Yuri didn't move.

"You. You love skating - I'm not sure about much about you, but I do know that. It means the world to you but you've lost yourself to the points and rankings, and it broke you when you failed to get them."

His name was called again. The arena fell near silent.

"So just go out on that ice and don't care about how perfect or imperfect it is. Feel the music. Skate for yourself."

"I don't know how to do that."

A second of silence. The final call.

"Can you skate for me, then?"

Yuri took a trembling breath. 

"I- I think so."

He took off the safety covers of his skates and stepped onto the ice.

"I'll try."

The crowd was deathly silent as the music began, so silent Yuri was sure his heartbeat could be heard resonating through the arena. His right leg automatically slid forward with the first proper beat - wrong. He was supposed to start with a turn.

He didn't care.

The melody was reaching its crescendo. Most of Yuri's jumps worked out, except for the quad Salchow, it turned into a triple. And he stumbled on the triple Axel. And just now, he lost the beat.

He didn't care.

He thought of Viktor, the way he lit up like a firecracker whenever he encouraged Yuri on, and he didn't care.

The final beat seemed to ring through Yuri's body rather than the air. A second after, the twelve thousand people in Moskva's Sports Palace exploded in applause, and Yuri bowed to them, a smile on his face, silence in his head.

He made it. It wasn't his best performance, not by a long shot. He saw his name come up in the fourth place and watched it fall to the fifth during the remainder of the short program. 

It wasn't his best work, no. But no performance had ever left him feeling so light.

As there was no actual competing on his schedule the next day, Yakov grudgingly let Yuri out of his sight. Wandering slowly from their hotel into the Petrovsky Park, Yuri felt as if he had entered a different world. After the clamorous, sometimes oppressive presence of skaters, coaches, personnel and journalists, this place, with all its trees and a thick blanket of snow, seemed like an unlikely occurrence. He found a bench and sat on it without bothering to push away the snow. Who cared about a wet coat? As long as he didn't catch a cold from it, no one.

People passed him without giving him a second glance, chatting away, and Yuri contentedly stretched his legs in front of him and sighed. It was a good day. A nice day. The quiet he should enjoy before the storm.

Somebody sat down next him.

Yuri didn't know how he knew - maybe he heard footsteps that his brain immediately identified - but he knew. 

"You came."

"I did." There was a smile in Viktor's voice. "I wanted to come around yesterday to congratulate you, but Yakov thought I should wait."

"Yesterday?" Yuri finally turned his head to look at Viktor. "You were here?"

"Of course I was. You skated wonderfully."

"Why did you tell me you wouldn't be coming, then?" Yuri asked, not angry, not whiny - just curious.

"To give you a chance to sort yourself out by yourself."

"Which I didn't."

"Which you did. Partly," Viktor said and something genuinely proud seeped into his voice. "You did better than I expected, to be honest."

"I did?" Yuri marvelled, his eyebrow climbing up.

"You know you did. After the struggle of the past two months to finish the short program in the fifth place? That's amazing."

"I could've been better, though."

"Everyone can always be better. Someone will always be better, in some ways. The point of this was - is - that you realised you can skate for the sake of skating and not feel like you messed up. You don't feel like you messed up, do you?"

"No," Yuri muttered, playing with his gloves. "I thought I would. I had such big expectations for the Europeans back in December, but yesterday, 76.85 felt satisfying. Even though it's probably the lowest short program mark I got since my junior debut."

Viktor laughed lightly.

"That was, what, three years ago?" he teased. Yuri chucked some snow on him because he could and because he felt like it. "Hey!"

"Yes. There's nothing wrong with that."

"Not saying there is," Viktor said, shaking the snow out of his hair, smile firmly in place, eyes sparkling with mischief. A second later, Viktor's arm was wrapped around his waist while the other pushed a sizeable lump of snow underneath Yuri's coat.

Yuri let out a squeal worthy of a nine-year-old seeing a bee and jumped up, unzipping his coat and desperately trying to get the snow out. Viktor was not holding back and his laughter rang through the trees loud and clear.

"Okay, let me help you." Viktor stood up, taking a step towards Yuri who promptly took a step back, squinting at Viktor distrustfully.

"I think not."

Viktor held his hands up in surrender. Yuri sighed.

"If you stick more snow down my sweater, I swear to God-"

Viktor's hands snaked underneath Yuri's coat, shaking the layers, dislodging the melting lump. Yuri felt it move down in a freezing trail and shivered.

"All done," Viktor trilled, stepping away. "Turn around."

He did. Viktor zipped him up and adjusted his scarf as if he were his mother, and checked his phone. 

"It's about time for dinner. Let's get back before Yakov finishes preparing his 'pre-competition responsibility' talk."

"Yeah," Yuri agreed, not sure whether he was flushing because of Viktor's proximity or because he had just had the hell mommed out of him. "Let's go eat."

Friday afternoon found Yuri bouncing on his tiptoes in a hallway down from the waiting room. Viktor didn't come with him here, saying that it wasn't really a good place for him, that he'd better stay out in the audience. Grudgingly, Yuri let him go.

It was becoming a slight problem, this dependence he at some point started growing and was now carefully cultivating. He used to be perfectly fine by himself - signed himself in, picked up his papers, carried and looked after his stuff, after himself. Nowadays he relied on Yakov with a whole lot and on Viktor with the rest and he really needed to get his act back together sometime soon because this was incredibly embarrassing - and he didn't have time to ponder this problem now, because it was almost his turn. Ten minutes tops. He should go back and prepare.

"Ready to take yourself down?"

Yuri whipped around, startled, only to come face to face with an unfamiliar black-haired man.

"Prahstite?"

"Nobody's expecting much from you, anyway, pretty fairy. You lost your wings already." The man smiled in the way a rabid dog would've smiled at a bunny. Yuri's stomach clenched uncomfortably.

"I'm going to go." Yuri turned, the man's words ringing loud in his ears. 

"Running away from me? That's not very polite." 

Strong fingers gripped on Yuri's arm. Without thinking, Yuri slammed the elbow of his other arm back. A loud yelp came and Yuri didn't wait for any more than that, sprinting until he hit the waiting room.

"V poryadke?" Yakov asked immediately, taking in Yuri's hard breathing.

"Yeah. All good."

He wasn't. But nobody except him needed to know that. It would be fine. 

It took five whole minutes for his heart to finally start beating calmly. His brain, on the other hand, whirred on, but instead of fright and panic, righteous anger was boiling over.

How dare that man talk to him like that? So what that he had an arguably nice face - and how did that make him gay? - and so what that he had lost his last big competition? Yuri had missed the podium once - once in the whole time he had been skating professionally. That was more than most skaters could say.

Sure, that miss was spectacular - Yuri has never seen anyone in world-class figure skating mess up this much. Yakov had mentioned that someone fifteen years back went through something similar, but Yuri didn't remember that and no one else seemed to, either. And that still didn't give anyone the right to him that way.

His name was called. Seething, he stepped into the rink and skated a short lap before he stopped in the centre.

In any case, this time was going to be different. He already made it through the short program. He was going to make it through the free skate, too. And if it's not a win, so what - he was still qualified for the Worlds in March. 

It wasn't a win. Yuri's fingers were idly playing with the hem of his jacket, remembering the final scores that revealed his first fifth place in a few years. Catching himself in mirrors and windows left him furrowing his brows every time - he wasn't used to seeing his chest unadorned after a competition.

"Are you going to sleep now?" Viktor asked, making Yuri's eyes flit from the reflection of himself to the other man.

"Don't know yet." Yuri pressed number 3 on the elevator keypad and the door slid shut with a click before they jolted into motion, leaving Yuri feeling slightly unbalanced. He had never liked the mechanical coffins anyway. "I'm not sure I want to go to the banquet."

"You don't have to mingle. You can just stuff yourself full, steal a glass of champagne and a plate of desserts and go watch a movie in your room," Viktor said, typing away on his phone.

Yuri raised an eyebrow. "That sounds like a proper professional's advice."

Viktor's eyes widened slightly as if he had revealed something he shouldn't have, but then they almost disappeared when he smiled.

"That's why you have me here - professional advice."

"Right," Yuri mumbled, looking away. He kept forgetting that he was Viktor's job, the name on his payroll, a personalised version of the 9 to 7 opening hours of the psychologist surgery, with some special cases here and there. He got used to talking to Viktor as if he were someone close, someone trustworthy and reliable, a steady figure-

"Breathe," Viktor said suddenly, and Yuri drew in a long breath, not having realised his lungs were screaming at him. "Are you okay?"

_Ding!_

"I guess."

"Not the answer I'm looking for," Viktor said, ushering Yuri out of the elevator. "Did you eat after you skated?"

"Da."

"Did you drink?"

"Da. Viktor, I'm not six-"

"Did you shower?"

"Not yet."

"Then get to it and then we'll talk."

Yuri took in Viktor's determined expression.

"Fine."

They didn't talk. When Viktor carefully peeked into Yuri's room twenty minutes later, probably using the spare key from Yakov, Yuri was just on the verge of sleep, curled up in a ball on the impeccably made bed.

Viktor carefully drew a blanket from beneath him and covered him up before he left. A part of Yuri felt oddly soft about the gesture; it reminded him of his dyedushka doing the same thing when he was smaller.

He snuggled deeper into the pillow and let himself drift off.

January finally ebbed away and gave way to February with its dry sharp winds. The routine Yuri fell into after the Europeans worked like a well-oiled machine, training after a session after training after a ballet class and on and on and on. It really threw him off when Viktor suggested an alteration to his system one day.

"I wanted to ask you," Viktor started lightly as they walked past St. Michael's Castle, enjoying the weak rays of sunshine that broke through the otherwise perpetually grey sky.

"Yeah?"

"Could we reschedule tomorrow's session?"

"Why?" Yuri frowned. He didn't exactly have a problem with it, per se. His calendar really only consisted of training and Viktor, but it disrupted the comfortable flow of his days, and since he felt more content these days than he had had for the past several years, undoubtedly thanks to the routine, he had a nagging worry in the corner of his mind waving a red flag.

"One of my friends is coming to town for a short holiday. I'm supposed to pick him up at the airport tomorrow afternoon."

"Oh." Yuri kicked a heap of snow lightly and watched it scatter over the cleanly shovelled walkway. "Is it the guy you've been telling me about? Christophe?"

"Yeah." A slow, fond smile stretched across Viktor's lips. 

"Why come in February? Sankt Peterburg isn't exactly the most welcoming place right now," Yuri inquired, hands shoved deep into his pockets.

"Valentine's is in February."

Yuri felt his chest tighten inexplicably, like that one time his costume had been sewn just a little too tight and he could feel his ribcage pressing in when they zipped him up. His face warmed up and he pushed his chin into his scarf to hide.

He was jealous, Yuri realised with a start. Jealous of Christophe for stealing Viktor away. 

"What-," Yuri began shakily, but Viktor seemed not to notice. "What are you going to do?"

"Just stay home. People wouldn't be happy to see two men sitting alone in a restaurant on Valentine's Day." Viktor's expression had turned bitter before it went sad. "Christophe just went through a break-up anyway, that's why he's coming. Didn't want to spend the day alone."

"Oh. I thought- I thought you were together?" Yuri mumbled rather shyly. Viktor burst out laughing.

"No, no." Shaking his head, Viktor looked at Yuri with sparkling eyes. "People used to make assumptions about us when we were at university, but we were never like that. He would be thrilled to hear you say it, though, he used to love pretending we were in a relationship just to see people's reactions." His expression fell again. "He won't be doing much of that here, I already warned him."

They slowly walked across the bridge. The ice on the frozen river was cracking, the deep sounds resonating off the buildings. 

"Do you miss it?" Yuri asked.

"Miss what?"

"Italy and university and- and the freedom to do that, I guess?" Yuri stopped, looking up at Viktor when he did, too. "To walk around with a person you care about even though they're a guy?"

"In a way, I do," Viktor said. "But it's been pushed to the margins since there hasn't been someone to do these things with anyway. You don't really miss what you don't have a use for. Italy, though," his face lit up suddenly, "Italy, I do miss."

"What is it like?"

"Hot. And loud. Quite dirty, too, in the big cities, but really beautiful. You'll love it when we go to the Worlds," Viktor smiled brightly and Yuri's chest tightened again. He looked so happy remembering his other life, so excited; it made him seem so much younger and it occurred to Yuri that Viktor had never looked quite like this before. 

And neither had Yuri, come to think of it. He had been content before, happy, too, but never really as thrilled to be anywhere, or see anyone, as Viktor seemed to have been in Italy. Ambition drove Yuri for years and winning competitions left him sated; looking down at people from his own first place made him feel like he was standing on the top of the world. This, though, this - simple joy, was something he wasn't familiar with, and the realisation clawed a hole in his chest.

"Is it okay, then?" Viktor asked, startling Yuri out of his introspection.

"Is what okay?" 

"To reschedule the session?"

"Da, kaneshno!" Yuri said, remembering how they got themselves into this conversation in the first place. "Will you bring Christophe to the rink?"

"I should, shouldn't I?" Viktor laughed, bumping into Yuri's shoulder playfully. "Show him who's turning my hair even greyer than it is."

Towards the end of the Valentine's Day training, Viktor slowly floated into the stadium, arms flopping around as he talked animatedly to someone walking behind him. Yuri couldn't exactly immediately screech to a halt unless he wanted to attract a lot of attention, so instead, he just slowed into some nice circling around, observing the newcomer with a critical eye; Christophe, surely. There was blonde hair poking from under his coffee brown hat, eyes shining a brilliant green, and the colour was high on his cheeks, making him look like one of the matryoshka dolls tourists bought as souvenirs. His smile didn't drop for one second as he paid his utmost attention to whatever Viktor was saying.

And Viktor looked - happy, there was no other word for it. He looked so genuinely happy in the way Yuri just wasn't familiar with, and the sharp thorn of returning jealousy caught him unawares and sent him flying.

"Jesus! Is he okay?" 

The voice was unfamiliar, it must have been Christophe's. Oh, what a first impression Yuri was about to make.

"Zdrastvuy, Yuri!"

"Hi, Viktor."

"How are you exchanging hellos?" Christophe squeaked, obviously shocked, as Yuri scrambled up. "How do you not have a concussion?"

"Fell too many times to care," Yuri stated dryly. Christophe studied him with the expression of someone pondering another person's mental health.

"Christophe, please meet the person who keeps me busy these days," Viktor took charge after a split second of awkward silence. "Yuri, Christophe. Don't be fooled by the cute looks, he's a menace."

While Yuri felt a smirk trickle into his features, Christophe gasped in mock-offence.

"How can you?" Christophe wailed dramatically, clutching his heart. "I come all this way, I give you my love and care and attention-"

Viktor gave Yuri a significant look and Yuri lost it, the uncomfortable, constrictive feeling of envy forgotten. Christophe seemed to be genuinely nice; the kind of a person who would play the comic relief character in Viktor's personal drama.

Yuri would much like to know what the plot of that drama was. There were still so many unknowns where Viktor was concerned.

"How is your trip going?" Yuri asked. He was feeling polite today. And he wanted Viktor's friend to feel welcome, so.

"Awful," Christophe said, continuing his performance as he leaned in conspiratorially, whispering: "Tell me, is it always so woefully cold up here?"

"Afraid so."

"Horrendous."

"I know. We barely survive."

"I knew it! Oh, my poor children!" Christophe draped an arm over Viktor's and outstretched the other towards Yuri as he sobbed dry tears. Yuri could feel eyes on his back and knew the whole rink had stopped to watch the spectacle.

"Ugh," Yuri mumbled. "Could you maybe turn it down a notch, people are staring."

"As they should!" Christophe wailed, green eyes sparkling with mischief. Yuri now understood what Viktor had meant when he had called the man a menace. 

The two of them stuck around until the very end of the practice, sitting side by side, talking now in hushed voices, now so loudly the whole of Yubileyny could hear them. Yuri observed them silently from the rink, the comfortable way they interacted with each other, the light touches they traded back and forth as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

To them, Yuri supposed, it was.

Valentine's Day in Russia wasn't as pronounced a holiday as it was in America, but the shop windows Yuri passed on his way home were still littered with hearts of all sizes and colours. Romantic music wafted out onto the pavement every time somebody left a store, sometimes holding flowers, sometimes a bottle of wine. Everyone hurried to their loved ones as snow crunched underfoot and the cold February wind seeped through coats and boots alike. 

Yuri snuggled into his scarf, pushed his hands deeper into his pockets and let his mood sink lower into the confused, frustrated mess in his chest.

He wanted this, too, wanted somebody to come home to, especially today. At times, he wished for it just a little, so that it fluttered like a candle in the corner of his mind, but then sometimes it felt as if there was an aching hole in his chest, something missing. 

And seeing Viktor and Christophe together today... well, they weren't a couple, but they were so familiar with each other, so close. Before the Grand Prix Final, Yuri had thought he found someone like that. They had always had so much to talk about and even when they ran out of topics, the silences were never awkward, and Yuri had felt hopeful, excited. By now, though, that person probably didn't even remember Yuri; or worse, he remembered and wondered why Yuri never showed up to their first proper date. 

Suddenly, all the decorations seemed less adorable and more mocking.

Quickening his pace, Yuri almost flew through the streets, wet breath damping his scarf even as it froze, heart beating wildly. He didn't want to be alone. Didn't want to end up alone, for all his life, saying good morning to an empty flat and good night to his cat. He opened the front door of a block of flats and run up the stairs. One floor, two floors, zdrastvuyte, three floors, four floors, stop. 

Yuri stared at the door in front of him and his heart should be calming down now but looking at the doorbell he hadn't seen in three months had his blood pounding deafeningly in his ears, beating inside his skull.

Why did he- why would he-

Nikolai Plisetsky, the doorbell read. Of course. Of course he'd run to the only person who couldn't help him.

But Yuri missed him, missed dyedushka Nikolai. Even though he had hurt Yuri, Yuri still cared. Despite all the tears and yelling and pain of their fallout, he missed the only parent he remembered ever having.

Tears were pushing at the corners of his eyes while his breath came in a hitching, cut-off kind of way that made him lightheaded, unsteady on his feet. Bracing on the wall, he took - tried to take - a deep breath. He would be okay. He would be okay. He would-

The door opened.

Yuri's head snapped up and there stood his dyedushka, looking every bit as taken aback as Yuri. The silence only held up for a second before-

"Yurochka?"

-and Yuri turned around and ran.

The icy air outside hit him like a wall and he hastily wiped the tears off his face before they started freezing, head snapping left and right to decide which way to go. Not to Yakov's place, surely. He couldn't go sit it out in a café or something, not on Valentine's Day, and he couldn't just walk around in this cold; he might've been Russian, but that didn't mean he was immune to hypothermia. So where would he- where should he- oh, no-

Bracing his hands on his knees, Yuri ordered himself to breathe like he was supposed to. In for seven, out for five-

That didn't work.

Viktor.

Yuri fished out his phone, fingers clumsy with cold as he took off his gloves and searched frantically for Viktor's number, hitting the call button before he could think twice about it.

In for six, out for four?

Better.

The phone rang and rang, blowing holes into the fragile self-control Yuri had just established. 

"Allo? Yuri?"

Thank god.

"Viktor? I- Could I-"

Could he what? What exactly could Viktor do for him, seeing as he had a guest already - Yuri had probably interrupted their evening-

"Yuri, I can hear you panicking, _breathe_."

"I- I'm sorry, you have Christophe over and I called and it's Valentine's and you're celebrating and- and-"

"Yuri, _please_," Viktor said urgently. Yuri stopped pacing, completely unaware he had started. "What's wrong?"

"I, somehow I, well, we finished practice and- something went wrong in my head and I went to my dyedushka's place for some reason and I just wanted to leave because it was stupid of me but the door opened and he was there, Viktor, and I- I-"

"Did he say something to you?" Viktor asked sharply.

"No, I ran before he could, but I don't know what to _do_ now, I can't- I can't go to Yakov and Lilia, they're celebrating and being happy and I can't- I couldn't-"

"Give me a second," Viktor said before something rustled, Viktor presumably covering the phone's microphone with his hand. Voices trailed to Yuri nevertheless, muted as if thick fog separated them.

"You there?"

"Yeah," Yuri whispered weakly. The adrenaline was slowly fading, leaving him shaky and tired.

"Come to my place. I texted Yakov to let him know."

"But what about Christophe-?"

"Christophe is currently halfway through his second bottle of wine. Chances are, he'll be out before you arrive. Where are you?"

"Almost on Ostrov Dekabristov. Where do you live?"

"Where Bolshoy Prospekt meets Karpovka. You should take the metro, it's the Petrogradskaya station."

Yuri thought of getting into a tin can trapped underground and shuddered.

"I think I'll walk."

"Yuri, no, it's, like, five kilometres to get here-"

"Viktor, I can't- I can't get a metro now," Yuri said shakily. "It's an hour or so, I'd really rather- if it's okay with you, that is, if you need to go to bed, I'll go by metro- or I'll just go home, I'm asking too much and-"

"Yuri." 

Yuri went quiet.

"I'll see you in an hour," Viktor said softly. "You're not inconveniencing me in any way if that's what you thinking. Please walk safe."

"Okay," Yuri said, feeling much lighter than he had had ten minutes ago. 

"Okay. I'll see you in a bit."

The line disconnected. Yuri pocketed his phone, pulled his glove back on and slowly, carefully, pulled himself back into a recognisable state. 

Now.

The walk to Viktor's place seemed to take forever and no time at all. The numbness of his feet and the stiffness in his fingers told Yuri it was high time he got somewhere warm, but at the same time, the thoughts in his brain seemed to only have disappeared a second ago. As if his head were an empty room, his footsteps echoed in it, one after the other, precisely timed. Snow was quietly falling from the sky, whispering as it landed. Laughter sounded now and then from the restaurants. Cars passed every once in a while, appearing like ghosts before they rumbled past and winked out of existence. Time ceased to be a measurement.

Yuri walked, thinking of nothing, wishing for nothing.

"Bozhe moy," Viktor said at the same time Christophe mumbled "Good God" from behind him. Yuri blankly stared at them, both dressed in soft home clothes, Christophe gripping what was presumably the rest of his second bottle of wine. They looked like they were midway through a date night. Yuri's fingers would've curled into despairing fists if he weren't so frozen.

"You look like a White Walker," Christophe said, squinting at him.

"Not helping, lovely. Come on in, Yuri, we need to get you warm." Viktor's eyes were worried but kind, and Yuri would give the world to find out how he deserved that kindness. He had been nothing but a burden to Viktor, swamping him with his problems, shortcomings and weaknesses.

"I think you'd better take a warm shower," Viktor said, helping Yuri out of his coat. 

"Sure," Yuri murmured and watched as Viktor's eyebrows rose, understandably so. Yuri was rarely this timid, this agreeable. No wonder his dyedushka kicked him out. 

"Come on then. Into the bathroom with you."

Leaving his shoes at the door, Yuri padded softly after Viktor. Everything about his apartment felt like home: photographs on the walls, pillows and a blanket on the couch, movie playing softly in the background. Christophe settled on the carpet in front of the TV like he belonged there, drawing a soft dark blue blanket around his shoulders. Averting his eyes as if he were witnessing something private, Yuri walked into the empty bathroom. A split second later, Viktor appeared with a towel in his hand.

"A clean one, I promise," he smiled, but the smile seemed to have cracks in it. 

"Spasibo," Yuri murmured, reaching out to take it. His frozen fingers couldn't grip it properly, and it slipped out. Viktor snatched it, lighting fast.

"How long have you been outside? Before you called me?"

"Not too long."

"Yuri."

"Twenty minutes? Thirty?"

Viktor let out a sound of displeasure. "You've lived here for years. You should know better."

_Something like this- this boy- could destroy your career. Don't you want to keep skating? You should know better. _

Yuri shook his dyedushka's voice out of his head. He couldn't go down that road now. Or ever.

"I know," he said, eyes not meeting Viktor's.

It was silent for a second. 

"Anyway, you hop into the water. Hopefully it'll thaw you." 

"Okay," Yuri whispered, stiff fingers going to pull his sweater off, useless. Viktor was walking away.

"Could you-" Too much. Wasn't Yuri about to ask too much? 

The steps stilled. "Yeah?"

"I can't-" Yuri tried again, hands scrabbling around the hem to no avail.

"Oh." The sound was flat. Yuri could see Viktor shift his weight from foot to foot. "I think... that would be... inappropriate?"

Of course it would. What was he thinking? Stupid, he was sometimes so _stupid_-

"Are you sure?"

Was he sure? He couldn't do it by himself. He needed- help.

"Please."

Yuri burrowed deeper into the couch and pulled the blanket tighter around his legs. The shower had chased out the cold from his skin, but not from his bones.

"There you go." A cup of steaming tea appeared in front of his face; he took it. The porcelain burned, and it felt good.

Viktor sat down heavily in the other corner of the couch, watching Christophe with a fond expression as he sang the closing song of Love Actually, and Yuri was once more swamped with the realisation that he had crashed their night. They probably hadn't seen each other in years. 

Warmth was slowly seeping into him, making him sleepy. Distantly, he heard Viktor dragging a very tipsy Christophe into the bedroom. It was quiet. Peaceful. Sleep seemed to be so close he could feel the tendrils of it wrapping around him.

"Whoa," came suddenly, and Yuri snapped his eyes open just in time to see Viktor steady the mug in his hands. Yuri would blush if he had any energy left.

"Put it on the table, please?" he mumbled, and Viktor did. Yuri expected him to say good night and go to bed. Instead, Viktor sat down again, feet on the couch, facing him. He had that strangely soft, inquisitive look on his face that he usually reserved for their sessions. Yuri sighed.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"For calling? For cutting your evening short? For messing with the first time you've seen Christophe in a while?"

Viktor watched him for a second. 

"Apology accepted, though it wasn't needed. I care about you, Yuri. And Christophe- understands."

"How?"

"How, what?"

"How does he understand? He only met me this morning."

Viktor shifted. "He studied communication and politics, with a side of psychology, plus he's a natural at reading people. He can tell more about someone in ten minutes than I can in a session."

"That must be a tough friendship. Can't ever hide anything." Yuri shuddered at the thought.

Laughing, Viktor ran his hand along the top of the couch, pale skin shining against the dark grey. "I suppose it would be if we weren't so honest with each other anyway. I'd trust him with anything. His skills have also made my life easier on many occasions because he had figured out for me what I couldn't myself."

That must've been handy. Yuri kind of wished he had someone to figure stuff out for him.

"Are you feeling better?"

Yuri looked up to find Viktor staring at him, gently, like a concerned parent. It made his chest tighten, and he turned away.

"Yeah. I can feel my toes now."

"You know that's not what I meant."

Fiddling with the corner of his blanket, Yuri tried to consider it, but his head didn't like returning to the topic.

"I don't know."

"Can you tell me what happened?"

"What if I don't want to?"

"Then I'll go to bed and we'll come back to it later."

Yuri sighed and looked up again. Viktor's face was half-hidden in the shadow, half glowing golden in the lamplight. There was a crease in between his eyebrows, genuine concern etched into his sharp features. He looked exhausted, he looked worried, and Yuri had already caused him enough problems. 

"I felt like I was alone. I don't have friends. I don't have a family. Yakov and Lilia were celebrating their own Valentine, the other skaters went home to their other halves, you disappeared with Christophe and I was walking from the training, hearts and love all around, and I just- I just couldn't take it. I wanted someone to care about me and every time I have ever felt like this before, I always went to dyedushka because he was the only steady ground in my life." A beat of silence. "I just forgot that we're not like that anymore. Seeing him brought it all back."

"Brought what back?" Viktor's voice was as gentle as the flickering light of a candle.

"The leaving, I suppose? The fight. The packing and the trudging through the city without any idea of where I was headed. It sort of felt like this ever since. Like- wandering." He folded his hands together and pulled his knees up, keeping himself together.

"You know that's not unreasonable, right? Losing him was like losing a parent to you. It leaves a mark."

Yuri snorted, an ugly jab of a sound.

"That it sure did."

"You can't let that bring you down. You're so young, just beginning to rise. Don't let it stop you."

Yuri unfurled from his tight ball, facing Viktor properly for the first time.

"What do you know? Maybe I want it to drag me down. Maybe I want to stop this after this season. Maybe I want to drop everything and move to a different country just like you did and start from scratch."

"You don't want that."

"Don't tell me what I want!"

"Running won't help you."

"But what if it did? Maybe, just maybe, I would have a chance to explore who I am except a skater, maybe I'd find people who care. I could have a new life!"

"It doesn't work like that!" 

Yuri stopped short. He had never heard Viktor raise his voice. The other man's blue eyes seemed to glow, his fingers curled into the couch like he was stopping himself from grabbing Yuri by the collar.

"You can't just outrun everything! You can't hide forever!"

Yuri recognised that soft tremble in Viktor's voice. It sounded exactly like him when he was recalling something painful. Bit by bit, Viktor settled down. Yuri watched him carefully.

"Do you want to tell me?"

Viktor's eyes snapped up, body going tense. Yuri held his gaze.

"Do I want to tell you what?"

"Don't play stupid. You know what I'm asking, I've learnt that question from you."

"There's nothing to tell."

"That's a lie."

"It's none of your business."

"Maybe."

They stared at each other. Yuri refused to let go first. Viktor eventually did. 

"I don't want to tell you."

"I can't make you. But I want you to know," Yuri said, never averting his eyes, "that I'm here if you do want to. You've helped me and listened to me and been patient with me for months now. You said you cared about me. And you should know I care about you too. When you want to talk, I'm here."

Viktor stared at him, obviously taken by surprise. Then, a slow smile spread across his lips.

"Keep that up and you'll be able to take my job."

Yuri snorted. The tension fell away. Viktor yawned widely.

"Bed."

"Yeah." Yuri quirked a smile. "Bed."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Russian:  
Allo? - Hello? (when talking on the phone)  
dyedushka - grandfather  
Rozhdestvo - like Christmas, but in January  
Prahstite. - Excuse me.  
V poryadke? - (Are you) Okay?  
Da, kaneshno. - Yes, of course.  
Zdrastvuy. / Zdrastvuyte. - Hello (casual) / Hello (polite)  
Ostrov Dekabristov - Dekabristov Island in St Petersburg  
Bolshoy Prospekt - avenue in St Petersburg  
Karpovka - river in St Petersburg  
Bozhe moy. - (Oh) My God.  
Spasibo. - Thank you.
> 
> Also, the best of luck and all the safe landings to Yuzuru Hanyu & all the other skaters in today's GPF, I can't wait to see it.


	3. Chapter 3

Sunlight was sneaking under Yuri's eyelids, and he blinked several times to clear the mist, stretching. The blanket slipped away, and he meant to turn on his side and reach for it but stopped short when the unfamiliarity of the room sunk in. There were a lot of windows. The wooden floors were covered by soft carpet here and there, a small kitchen hid in the corner, and three doors that led, presumably, to the bedroom, bathroom and out. Everything seemed modern and well-kept. But where-

Last night came to Yuri in crystalline detail, his journey to his grandfather, the long, empty walk to Viktor, their late-night chat. Grabbing the blanket, Yuri curled up, eyes wide open.

Whatever had happened to Viktor in the past clearly still hurt, and the upset tone of his voice pushed on Yuri's mind like the tide. Viktor was never upset. 

The man was one big puzzle. Yakov had said he had a skating background, which was well-evidenced by his keen eye for errors and potential improvements. He had lived in Sankt Peterburg for years before he left for Italy to study. He had no one to spend Rozhdestvo with, and it seemed there were no friends close enough for him to visit. Or, if there were, he chose not to.

Viktor only got truly upset when Yuri suggested he'd run away from his life in a heartbeat. Did Viktor run away from something all those years ago? Maybe he, too, had a life here, a life that disappointed him, made him want to start anew.

Something shifted in the room to his right. Barely audible footsteps floated to him before the door cracked open and Christophe walked out on unsteady legs, blinking blearily in the sunlight. One hand on the wall for support, he got himself to the bathroom. Seconds later, the sounds of falling water began filtering in.

He had a million questions and no clue how to find answers, so instead, Yuri closed his eyes and enjoyed the peace for a little bit longer. 

The Worlds were four weeks away, and Yuri could definitely feel it.

"Yisho raz!" Yakov yelled, and Yuri sighed. One more time then. He got into his starting position in the centre of the rink, one hand outstretched, the other supporting the elbow. Music began playing and with a push on the fourth beat, he stepped forward.

This short program wasn't his favourite. The music was just a bit too bland to fit the persona he had worked so hard to create, and the sequences weren't as demanding as his usual performances would have warranted. The whole thing had a very _safe_ feeling. In another time, he would get very angry about it, but now, safe was good. This kind of safe, he could handle.

The Viktor-kind of safe, he still didn't know what to do with. 

The morning after Valentines Day, Yuri had kept his eyes closed until Viktor woke up. He had heard him padding into the living room, sensed him leaning over the couch. Viktor had stood there for a moment while Yuri steadfastly pretended to be dead to the world. Then Viktor's fingers brushed a strand of hair out of Yuri's face and he pulled the blanket higher over Yuri's chest. Yuri had been barely breathing. With a sigh, Viktor had joined Christophe in the bathroom. Yuri's eyes had snapped open with the click of the door and in two minutes, he had been standing outside the building, trying to remember which way to go home even though his heart was telling him that _home_ was right behind his back.

"Focus!" Yakov's voice broke Yuri out of his reverie, and he suddenly remembered that he was practising his short program in Yubileyny, not waking up in Viktor's apartment. Although the steps were ingrained in his muscles, it took more to skate something properly than to know where his legs were supposed to be. He propped himself a little straighter, tilted his head a little further. Thought by thought, he forced Viktor and the way his place felt out of his head until only the sharp sound of skates on ice remained.

The Worlds were four weeks away, and he wanted to be ready.

"How are you?"

Yuri turned his eyes away from the Hermitage to look at Viktor. They were sitting in what would in a few weeks be a small park on the south tip of the Hare Island. In February, though, it was a stretch of greyish ground with the walls of the Peter and Paul Fortress rising on its side. The tall golden spire of the cathedral peeked from behind the stone, glittering in the cold sunlight.

"I'm okay," he replied.

"That's it?"

"Yeah. My programs are going well. I finally got used to living with Yakov and Lilia. I don't feel like I'm going to spiral into a panic every other day. I don't miss dyedushka as much anymore. So yeah, I'm okay." He inhaled deeply, letting the freezing air burn in his lungs. "Are you okay?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Being in denial won't help you," Yuri pointed out. "Did Christophe get home safely?"

"Yeah, yeah," Viktor smiled, shaking his head. "He keeps sending photos from his beach trips. Which is funny because I know for a fact that it's not warm enough to be on the beach yet. Not even in Italy."

"Of course he is. Will he come to Milan? For the Worlds?"

"He forgot to get the tickets, so he might not be able to actually watch in the arena, but he's definitely coming to celebrate."

Yuri quirked an eyebrow. "He knows I won't win anything, right?"

Viktor pulled a confused face. "One, he'll celebrate anything and everything. Two, why wouldn't you win?"

"I don't know, I just sort of... feel it? Like." Yuri took a moment to figure out his thoughts. "Before every other competition I've been in, I could always tell whether or not I was going to stand on the podium, and I was always right. And this time, I just feel I won't be leaving Italy with a medal."

"You are training so hard, though, and both your programs look incredible. I'd know," Viktor winked.

"How would you know?"

The ice on the river rumbled, preparing to break as soon as the weather got just a bit warmer. Yuri watched as the implication of what had been said slowly trickled into Viktor's features. 

"I guess I'm caught," Viktor said, hands gripping each other in his lap.

"I don't think you've done anything wrong, so caught probably isn't the best word. And you still don't have to tell me, you know."

"You're curious, though?"

Yuri laughed. "I've been curious on and off ever since we met, depending on how well or awful I was feeling. And your work must be paying off because I've been feeling well lately and so had a lot of time to question your life story."

"And what a story it is. Greek tragedy and all that."

Viktor fell silent, and Yuri waited. If he had learnt anything from the sessions, it was that silence and patience often worked better than words. 

"I was a figure skater, too," Viktor said, and Yuri nodded. He had figured as much. "And I was pretty good. Kind of like you."

Yuri smiled a little.

"We're more alike than that, though, which, in all honesty, is why Yakov asked me to come and help you. When I was fourteen, my mother came to pick me up after training and found me kissing another skater by the toilets. A boy."

The air caught in Yuri's throat, and he looked over to Viktor, who seemed to be hanging on by a thread.

"We went home and she asked me what it was about. I told her I liked him and she sent me to conversion therapy as soon as the season was over." 

Viktor seemed to shrink into himself even as he sat up straighter. 

"It... messed me up, for the lack of a better word. I got anxious and distrustful, and I started to hate skating because my mother would come along to the rink to keep an eye on me, like I would blow the whole place up if she gave me a chance. She would yell if I talked to a boy too long, or looked at them too much, and I hated it and I hated her and I hated myself and when a car hit her just before my seventeenth birthday, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the funeral. Isn't that awful? My own mother, and I almost laughed when they piled on the dirt."

Yuri sat frozen still. What do you say when somebody tells you a story like that? Viktor's own mother sent him to conversion therapy. His dyedushka kicking him out suddenly seemed like a walk through a rose garden.

"I stayed with my aunt for a while," Viktor carried on, face blank. "She made a point of ignoring me, and I think she only let me stay because of the foster benefits she was getting. Everything really dawned on me then, what happened, what I did, who I was, and what my home thought of me, what my _country_ would think of me. When the junior championship came, I completely fell apart. 

"The stress was the last drop, I think. I had some money from the competitions I won, some that I inherited from my mother. I didn't feel safe or welcome here, so I left. I essentially dropped a coin on the map of Europe and went where it fell. I met Chris soon after, and the rest you already know."

"That's why you always give such good advice. It's not that you have a degree," Yuri whispered, terribly afraid of saying something wrong, "you just have experience."

"I guess you could say that." The corner of Viktor's mouth quirked up and his body relaxed. "I tried to be there for you in the ways I wish someone had been there for me. I tried to do good by you if that makes sense. I hope I did."

"Viktor," Yuri said, turning his whole body to face him. "I don't think you realise how much you've done. I wanted to drop skating, I wanted to hide away, I wanted to give up in pretty much every sense of the word before you came along and dragged me back. You did so much."

"Thank you for saying that. It means a lot."

Yuri looked at the man in front of him and didn't know what more to say - so he didn't. They sat in silence until the cold got too unbearable and then made their separate ways home. As Yuri watched Viktor disappear around the corner, he wondered if Yakov knew this was going to happen - that Viktor was going to get through to him because he had once lost just about everything that mattered because of who he chose to hold hands with. 

He walked home slowly, not really thinking, but not stuck in a haze, either. Like a badly cut movie, scenes appeared in his mind - Viktor letting him cry on his shoulder in the church, Viktor saying he had studied psychology with a focus on sport because he wanted to understand what was behind the performance. Knowing what had happened to him, Yuri couldn't help but think that Viktor chose that degree as a halfway point between going to therapy and not doing anything. He probably got to analyse what had gone wrong with his sports career from a theoretical viewpoint and figured out solutions for himself. Yuri wondered if the things Viktor did to support him were the same ones he had once used.

At least now he knew why Viktor's name sounded familiar. He must've heard about him in the sports news when he was little, a skating star with an abrupt downfall. They really were alike in more ways than one.

February slowly trickled into March. The weather stayed greyish and unwelcoming, albeit slightly warmer as the numerous puddles on the sidewalk could testify. The trees around Yubileyny started to bud and there was an expectant scent of life in the air. Yuri found that funny because the further on March went, the more tempted he was to reverse the clock and go into hibernation. The Worlds were here.

They left Sankt Peterburg on Saturday, five days before the men's short program was supposed to start. The day was, in Yuri's opinion, unnecessarily bright, carrying just a hint too much excitement as they boarded the plane to Italy.

"Why is there so much sun?" Yuri complained, turning his head to avoid the rare golden rays coming from the window.

"You are going to love Milan," Viktor replied, voice strained as he pushed his luggage into the overhead compartment. "The forecast said rain today and tomorrow, but proper sunshine on the competition days." The locker shut with one final click, and Viktor took his seat with a happy sigh, eyes closing.

"I don't mind that," Yuri said, tugging the blind down impatiently. "I'll be in the arena then."

"Surely not all the time. I know for a fact that Christophe has a list of activities planned for us." Viktor's smile suggested he was familiar with the plan and agreed with it.

"I don't really understand that," Yuri said, prompting Viktor to peek at him.

"Understand what?"

"Why does Christophe have plans for _us_? I'm not friends with him. We barely met."

"Don't let him hear you say that. I think he considers you a legacy."

"A legacy?"

Viktor hummed. "I told him about my job, therefore I told him about you. Nothing that's not public knowledge," he added quickly, noticing Yuri's tight expression. "But I did tell you he's good at reading people. He put together his own picture and knowing him as I do, he probably got it right."

"Was he right about you when you first met?" 

The question was softly spoken, so softly in fact, that Viktor seemed not to hear it. Or he chose not to. They hadn't strayed back to the topic of Viktor's young adult life after that one conversation. 

That day, after Yuri had made it home, he sat down on his bed and Googled Viktor's name, assuming that since Viktor already laid himself pretty much bare, the no-research rule expired. There hadn't been a lot online, but then again, there hadn't been nothing. He had a very short Wikipedia page, basic information, no picture, a list of achievements. The article said Viktor had never made it into the seniors, presumably because of the absolute flop that was his last junior championship. Other articles were similar. There was nothing on Viktor for a couple of years until he eventually appeared on an Italian university's website and then a psychologist practice page in Moskva. Nothing on personal life. No rumours. No exposés.

It was really strange to see so little information available on someone as distinguished as Viktor used to be. Yuri thought it must have been an internet thing. If Viktor rose to fame today, his looks and talent would win him thousands of fans worldwide and flowering social media accounts. It would have been a blessing to his career; or a curse, since allegations and rumours of people being LGBT flew quicker than fighter jets in the online world. Perhaps it was a relief that he had got to escape without other people trying to record his life regardless.

As the plane shuddered and started to roll down the runway, Yuri pulled up the window blind a little and let the light come in. The scenery was passing by faster and faster and then with a lurch, it disappeared. Next to him, Viktor laughed quietly, earphones in, probably listening to a book. Yuri hoped he could grow to be someone like Viktor. Someone who, no matter how much darkness the world had put them through, could live a life they enjoyed.

The Mediolanum Forum looked like a concrete Inca pyramid with spaceships attached to the sides. It also looked completely deserted. Although, that might have been because people who wanted to take a midnight walk rarely wandered into empty parking lots when all the wonders of the Milan centre were half an hour away. 

Yuri jumped over a patch of grass and then promptly sat on it. The ground was still slightly damp from the afternoon showers and the air had a strange coolness to it, just like Sankt Peterburg did later in the year. The night was quiet except for the cars rushing down the highway, speeding out of Milan to go home, or maybe into it to enjoy a lovely night. Picking up the rock next to his shoe, Yuri turned it this way and that between his fingers, staring at the strange shape of the arena he was going to compete in in a few days, and felt himself fade away bit by bit. Odd as it was, there was no nervousness, no anxiety, no fear simmering under his skin.

Whatever happened during the championship, he knew he had done what he could to perform perfectly. Whatever happened, he knew his future would be shaped by it. If he medalled, he would continue training, continue competing. If he lost, he would - finally - finish high school, find a good university and skate when he wanted to. 

He didn't know when he had decided that. Maybe when the dates for next year's Attestat had appeared on his high school's website; or when Yakov mentioned in passing a song he thought would be good for Yuri's next short program and everything inside Yuri tightened like a bowstring.

It didn't matter when the decision had been made, anyway. What mattered was that he believed in it, was committed to it and whatever outcome he ended up with, he'd be content with it.

Breathing hard, Yuri skated to the edge of the rink, pulled the guards on and waddled awkwardly to the closest empty bench. It was quite early in the morning and yesterday's late night was catching up to him in the form of unfocused thoughts and shaky knees. Sitting down heavily, he let his body sag like an empty potato bag, sinking lower and lower, creasing and folding until his position was almost horizontal.

"That can't be good for your posture," said a lightly accented voice, and all of Yuri's muscles locked up. 

It couldn't be. 

Well, technically it could. Yuri had been so busy drowning in his head he didn't really familiarise himself with the list of competitors. And the person whom the voice belonged to - he was brilliant. He had skated well for as long as Yuri could remember, or, well, at least during all the time before the date they hadn't gone to because Yuri had that argument with his dyedushka and had to move out and was near catatonic for a week and so hadn't had time to answer calls and messages and when he had, it had been too late, and really, if this boy's career had crashed and burned since December, he would have no clue. But obviously, it hadn't. He was here. World Championship. And also _here_, as if in, standing about a meter away. 

Yuri opened his eyes.

"Phichit."

"It's been a while. And you haven't liked any of my photos in months." Phichit smiled, the kind of smile where you simply couldn't contain yourself. Yuri didn't understand. He had made the first step last year and then proceeded to fall for this boy just a little, and then they planned a proper date and Yuri basically stood Phichit up without offering any explanation at any point since. Phichit should be angry. Or at least cold and unfriendly. He had every right to be.

He was sitting down next to Yuri, resting his sharp elbows on his knees.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Yuri breathed, still as a statue. "You?"

"Excited. So, so excited."

Yuri smiled at that. Shakily, but nevertheless. "Got a masterpiece planned?"

"As per usual. I couldn't bear to disappoint."

"You did always live to please."

"You know me oh-so-well."

The words were just a tad too bitter to be teasing, and all Yuri could think of was the reason why he knew Phichit so well. They had used to chat as often as their busy schedules and different time zones allowed. They had used to meet at competitions and talk for hours and hours. On one memorable occasion, they had snuck out of the hotel at 4am to go buy Milky Ways because according to Phichit, they were the superior chocolate bar, and Yuri didn't believe him. And that was how Milky Ways had made their way onto his rarely-allowed-but-dearly-loved food list. He hadn't had one since December.

The silence started pressing down on him like a falling sky, and he fidgeted, knowing he should say something, but also at a complete loss of anything to say. Should he apologise? Should he explain? Should he poke the pile and see if Phichit lets the wasps out? 

"Phichit," he began and promptly shut up when the other boy shushed him.

"I know that tone and I don't want to hear it. It's been a long time. I got over it."

"How do you always know what I want to say?" Yuri finally looked up and found Phichit watching him, this time with a soft, open expression.

"Because I also know you oh-so-well."

With those words, Phichit rose and walked away, leaving Yuri staring at his back. He didn't realise how much guilt had been hiding in the dark corners of his brain, outperformed by the other problems in his life. It was funny how certain things could temporarily disappear beneath other issues, only to peek out once you got on level ground with the rest.

As if sensing his ward was in distress, Viktor appeared, eyes searching. When he found Yuri, he started to him in a way Yuri had learnt to associate with concretely laid-out plans.

"Where are we going?" He asked as soon as Viktor entered his hearing range.

"Who said we're going anywhere?" Viktor asked as he took Phichit's place on the bench.

"But we are, aren't we?" There must have been something in his face because Viktor's brow wrinkled.

"What happened?"

"Nothing."

"Come on, Yuri, I think we're past this."

Yuri sighed. Because Viktor was right. And because he couldn't afford to let himself steam in regret and uncertainty in the few days before the competition.

"I just- met someone. Someone I know."

Viktor didn't press.

"Do you remember when I said there was a date? That I was supposed to meet someone after the Final?"

Viktor nodded.

"Turns out he also got to the World Championship."

"You talked."

"You could say that. He said he got over the fact that I stood him up on our first date."

"And you don't believe him."

"I don't know. It was really surprising to see him." Yuri was snapping the elastic on his gloves in a steady rhythm, brow furrowed. "I would've thought it'd be worse, though. I don't think I had expected to be yelled at, but I thought there would be more of a reaction. More of a fuss. Like this, it just feels like- like-"

"Like it wasn't that important at all?" Viktor offered.

"Yeah," Yuri said, swinging his feet.

"You should talk about it. If not before the competition, then definitely after."

"I know. I'll try."

Viktor looked at him like he was inspecting every detail of his face. Then he leaned back and smiled.

"You really like him."

"That's the weirdest part. I did in December, but a lot of things have changed since then. We didn't get off to a good start and he didn't even cross my mind in the past months. And just now he was so- accepting and calm about everything, I'm not sure if he cares."

"All the more reason for you to talk to him. It's always better to know where you're standing."

"I guess," Yuri said, straightening up. "Now that that's done, will you tell me what you came here to tell me?"

"Oh yes, I almost forgot!" Viktor turned to him, and his eyes were shining. Yuri felt a twinge of apprehension run down his spine. Shining eyes meant trouble. "Christophe called. We're going on a small trip tonight. I already talked to Yakov," Viktor lifted his hands to stop Yuri from talking, "and he's okay with it as long as I get you back to the hotel before midnight, Cinderella."

Yuri grimaced but didn't say a word. If Viktor's excitement reached this high, it was going to be worth it.

The two days before the competition streaked past in a blur, and Yuri barely remembered them afterwards. He remembered walking past what seemed like a hundred churches in the Milan centre, people speaking quick, lilting Italian, and Christophe arguing with the guards when the Parco Sempione was closing at 9pm. He remembered Viktor being excited over meeting some competing skater, and seeing Phichit again. They exchanged smiles every time but hadn't spoken. 

Viktor noticed during the warm-up for the short program.

"Is he the one?" He asked as Yuri leaned on the side of the rink, drinking. He almost spat the water out.

"I don't know what you mean."

"Is he the one you were supposed to go out with after the Grand Prix Final?" Viktor clarified with an eye roll. For a grown man, he could be surprisingly petty sometimes. Yuri had a suspicion that this behaviour grew worse whenever he was allowed to spend time with Christophe.

"Yeah," Yuri mumbled under Viktor's unwavering gaze, his own eyes following Phichit as he jumped a single Salchow. It felt odd to have him close enough to touch if he wanted to. It was odder still that he wasn't sure if he wanted to. After all the conscious and unconscious deciding he had done since Phichit came over to talk to him, one would think he had reached a resolution. If only life were that easy.

"Try not to keep your eyes on him all the time," Viktor said flatly. "You could crash into the bannister otherwise."

"Very funny," Yuri huffed, but his grip on the water bottle tightened at the mention of crashing. 

"How are you?" Viktor asked, this time without any emotion other than a parental sort of curiosity.

"Weird. Nervous." Yuri cracked the knuckles in his fingers. "Apprehensive is probably the best word." 

He had decided what to do after the competition based on the results he would achieve, but that didn't mean he came to perfect terms with skating in front of a large audience again. The Forum was about the same size as the Sports Palace in Moskva where the Europeans had taken place, yet it seemed different. Maybe the Italian air was playing tricks on him, but it felt as if new rows of viewers appeared each time he checked.

"Any particular source of that apprehension?"

"I don't know. I think I just don't want to disappoint anyone. Including myself." Yuri shuffled his skates. "I want to think that I'm a lot better now than I was in December, but you don't really know that until you're in a situation that tests it, right?"

"You're worried this will end badly." 

"Not exactly," Yuri said, handing his bottle to Viktor who put it back into his bag. "I'm anxious to see how the results will make me feel. No matter what they are."

"So you think even good marks could throw you off?" Viktor asked, brow perfectly smooth, which meant he found the prospect very curious. 

"I think that anything other than average could throw me off. But good marks more than bad, I think, because a part of me has already made peace with finishing last."

"You won't finish last."

"I like to think I won't," Yuri said before he pushed himself off the barrier and back among the skaters.

Waiting for his turn to skate was like sitting on bubble foil. It was comfortable at first, but just like bubbles would burst with every movement, something in Yuri jumped at each new announcement. He knew when he was supposed to go up, knew the three names before him and yet he couldn't get the jitters out of his bones. 

Yakov, having asked Yuri twice if he needed anything and receiving a negative answer, stood by the TV and watched Seunggil Lee skate his fight-like program. Viktor was sitting next to Yuri, reading something on his phone. After several unsuccessful attempts to engage Yuri in a conversation, he opted to simply stay quietly by his side. Yuri suspected that on a different day, Viktor would have gone around to chat with people, but he seemed to feel the tension in Yuri's body and concluded he should stay at hand in case Yuri decided to share.

Yuri needed to sort through the situation by himself first, though.

He had run into Phichit the day before. 

There had been a strange kind of an itch under his skin that morning, one that he hadn't been able to pinpoint until lunch had come around and he just so happened to be sitting one table over from Phichit. Yuri found himself walking over as soon as Phichit's coach disappeared into the restroom.

"Hi," had been the only thing Yuri managed at first.

"Hey! How are you?" Phichit had watched him with the same open expression he used for everyone else as if the emotions he had previously shown had been warded off. Seeing Phichit act as if Yuri had been just another person on his friends list hit unexpectedly deep.

"I want to say I'm sorry. Don't tell me I don't need to," he had added quickly when he saw Phichit open his mouth. "I didn't come to the date, I didn't explain anything. The least I can do is apologise."

"Okay," Phichit had said, politely interested.

"Something happened right before the Final and I felt like I couldn't go and meet you. I wasn't really able to do much for a while after that and I'm sorry I didn't let you know and I'm sorry if you felt like I abandoned you."

Phichit's face had tightened a fraction at that, and Yuri felt so much worse for it.

"I want to go back, if you want," he had continued, the words falling from his lips before he even had a chance to check them, the same way they used when he was in contact with Phichit almost every day. "I miss talking to you."

Phitchit had stared at him for a long moment, fingers tracing patterns on his phone case. 

"I knew something had happened," he had said at last, eyes flicking to Yuri's face and then quickly away. "I had never seen you as upset as you had been that day and I was so worried when you didn't show up and when you didn't answer any of my messages. I thought something was seriously wrong, but then you came to the Europeans and you seemed okay. And I just thought," Phichit had inhaled shakily, and Yuri's heart just broke. "Well, I thought I was the reason you didn't come. That you didn't think I was worth letting know that you changed your mind."

It had left Yuri speechless and before he could formulate an answer that could convince Phichit that _that was not what happened, of course it wasn't_, Phichit's coach emerged from the restrooms.

"I don't have enough time to explain how wrong you are," Yuri had managed before the coach reached the table, Phichit looking up at him with empty eyes. Yuri had stood up, wanting to offer comfort, but unsure whether he'd be welcome. "We'll talk. After the competition, we'll talk."

"Sure," Phichit had mumbled. The _I've heard this before_ went unsaid. 

Yuri had scrambled away, trying to keep the trembling at bay.

Back in the waiting room, another skater got called into the rink to perform his short program. Yuri pushed his legs up onto the seat, curling his arms around them. Next to him, Viktor stilled for a second, waiting for Yuri to start talking and returning to his reading when he didn't.

Yuri could see Phichit's face when he had described his side of things. How the light had slowly trickled out of his eyes, how his features froze over, and it made Yuri so angry that he had allowed that happen. It made him even angrier that he had barely given this a thought in the past months, too self-absorbed, too lost in his head, too selfish to wonder about others.

"That's enough," Viktor said, gently prying Yuri's fingers away from his calves. Yuri didn't realise why until blood started flowing normally and spikes of pain shot through his legs. He was going to have bruises.

"I messed up," Yuri said quietly. "I talked to him and it turned out he was just a really good actor three days ago. I hurt him a lot and I didn't even realise until he said it to my face. That he didn't think I cared anymore. And I was thinking about just myself for so long, it didn't even occur to me to think about him."

"There's nothing wrong with taking care of yourself before you take care of others," Viktor reminded him. "You were thrown out of your home. Your world changed from its foundations up. I'm not trying to make excuses for you," Viktor intervened as Yuri was about to protest, "but I think you're being too harsh on yourself. Things happened. It's done."

"What do I do, though?" Yuri asked.

"Right now, you get up and go skate your short program," Viktor said just as they announced that Yuuri Katsuki, the last skater before Yuri, was entering the rink. "You give it your best and when it's over, you can decide what to do."

Stepping on the ice felt like stepping into a recording studio. The door shut behind you, letting the soundproofing erase all noise. You could watch people clap and shout, you could feel the vibrations of the music, yet the sound that hit your ears was barely a whisper, a distant echo of something you instinctively knew should be there but somehow wasn't.

Taking a spot in the centre of the rink, Yuri willed his fingers to stop shaking as he waited for the first note of his song. After that, his muscles counted the time by themselves, his hands and expression following the story by heart rather than by ear. He felt oddly weightless as the whole arena, the whole world, fell away a bit more with each glide forward, and the worries about Phichit - _chip!_ \- the lingering pain of his last living relative leaving him - _chip!_ \- were slowly chipped away with every secure landing. 

He only knew that time was passing because sweat drops slid down the back of his neck and a low ache settled into his muscles, familiar like the streets of Sankt Peterburg. He hastened into the last spin, slowed in the final steps and then, at last, everything stopped.

The noise of the crowd slowly pierced the fog, and the volume made him shrink into himself. He bowed curtly, once to each side of the stadium, before skating towards the rink's exit. Yakov was waiting there, a soft look on his usually hard features. As they walked towards the kiss and cry, Viktor joining them on the way, Yuri didn't quite know what to do with himself. The brightness and loudness of the world gained with his every step and it felt as if a thousand needles prickled his skin over and over. As he sat down, the tiredness sank in all at once. 

He didn't hear his name being called and if Yakov hadn't gripped his shoulder before the marks were announced, he wouldn't have remembered to wave into the camera at all.

He got 94.08, which was more than he had expected but not enough for the top five.

There was still a chance, Yakov pointed out. Yuri nodded out of habit, thinking of the tea in his hotel room, the Milky Way tucked into the small pocket of his luggage and the snow-white sheets of his bed. He had had enough of this day and said as much to both Viktor and Yakov before he disappeared.

Sleep came reluctantly that night even though Yuri had a long shower and then watched something silly on his laptop until the tea cooled down enough to drink. The Milky Way he had bought that morning was staring at him accusingly from the bedside table, so he tucked it into the drawer to eat later. It felt as if his stomach didn't exist and he wasn't sure whether trying to summon it back would be a good idea.

It was discouraging to see how quickly a person could revert into this state of mind. Just last week, he had felt like he had improved so much and now, watching the TV show characters flit around the screen, he cursed himself for jinxing it. It had taken so little - _so little_ \- to make it seem like the ground was breaking apart. Maybe it was because he had been in a bubble for the past few months. Focused on himself and the training, he had never really left his skating headspace. Christmas and Rozhdestvo, they should have been really important except they hadn't been; if he hadn't broken down on Valentine's Day, he wouldn't even remember it passed.

There had been no calls, no messages, no friends to meet, not even on his birthday, which he forgot about himself. If this competition had been full of distantly familiar faces, like the Europeans were, his space would have stayed intact, but it felt like Phitchit took a needle and popped the balloon, letting in light and fresh air. Yuri hadn't been prepared and now he was cowering in his hotel room where the colours and sounds were muted, trying to sow his balloon back together but unsure whether he should. Seeing Phichit again was painful, but now that he thought about it, it was better than the empty, sometimes anxious state he had been living in. 

And he did want to explain everything to him, even if it just made Phichit let go of the idea that Yuri didn't care. In all honesty, if they simply talked, Phichit understood and then they parted ways, he would be content. Not happy, because he would have lost something important, but content knowing that Phichit won't lose any more sleep and waking hours thinking he wasn't enough.

Yuri shut the laptop with a resolute click, pulled the drawer out and grabbed the Milky Way. The sweetness of it was cloying his throat, but that wasn't why he had trouble breathing. Teardrops were slowly turning the bedsheets a shade of grey while Yuri's brain was chanting _stop it stop it stop it_ to the frantic beat of his heart. The tightness in his chest built and built until he couldn't take it anymore and finally took a deep breath. The world swivelled off its axis, froze, and then righted itself. The tears kept coming and for every one that fell, a weight was lifted from Yuri's soul, so he let himself cry until he couldn't anymore and only a few minutes after that he stood up and cautiously made his way to the bathroom. 

Lights off, he washed his face and then sat down on the closed toilet. He felt undeniably better and with his head clear, it was easier to decide what he should do. Going to Phichit now wouldn't have been fair. The conversation he wanted to have would very probably be upsetting, which was the last thing either of them needed two days before a World Championship free skate. Yuri could wait. He cried it out once; if need be, he'll cry it out again.

The day between the short program and the free skate went pretty much the same as all the other non-competitive days of the competition, with one notable exception - Yakov went on a date.

He insisted it wasn't a date, but seeing that Lilia had flown all the way out of Moskva to Milan and stood by the door in an evening dress, Yuri thought the evidence was on his side. Judging by the barely suppressed smile on Viktor's face, he wasn't the only one, either.

"Behave," Yakov grunted before the door slid shut behind him, and it only took half a second for Yuri to start snickering and then there was vociferous laughter bouncing off the walls as both he and Viktor let go.

"How precious," Viktor wheezed, one hand on his sternum as if trying to convince it that it would get a full breath soon.

"I don't think I'll ever forget this," Yuri grinned, a first honest smile in several days. "Yakov, in a suit, saying _behave_ as he leaves with Lilia, dressed in a full-out gown, the day before the World Championship Final. This is a very late birthday present."

Viktor suddenly stilled, all laughter forgotten. "Oh god." 

"What?"

"Your birthday. We forgot about your birthday!"

"It's not like it matters, I'll have a party next year."

"It matters!" Viktor looked so genuinely distraught that Yuri stopped smiling.

"It's just a birthday," he said, shrugging. "With all of the other stuff that was happening, a birthday was the bottom of the priority list."

"So you admit it was on the list," Viktor countered, expression cloudy. After a moment, it started to brighten up.

"No." Yuri held both his hands up. "I don't know what you're thinking, but no."

"It's nothing crazy!"

"Sure, and I'm the emperor of China."

"Very funny," Viktor muttered, unimpressed. "I was just thinking room service and a nice movie and, like, half a glass of wine because you are both underage and you compete tomorrow morning."

"That's much tamer than I expected."

"That's because this is not the end of it. I'll call Christophe to help and then you'll have a proper birthday." He grinned as Yuri groaned. "You're allowed to be afraid now."

"Consider it done."

People were whispering. Wherever Yuri went the next day - to breakfast, to stretch out in the hallway, to sit in the waiting room - hushed conversation trailed after him like smoke off a torch. Now that he thought about it, people had been whispering on the day of the short program, too, only then Yuri had been too swept up in his own developing plot to notice he was the protagonist of another drama. He couldn't be surprised, though. He had fallen hard in December. Rumours had said he'd stop skating, his social media died a quick death and then he appeared on the Europeans, looking, as one sports magazine succinctly put it, _as if his skates were wearing and directing him, rather than the other way around, he seemed so far away from reality_. 

And now he was here. The biggest story of the season and everyone had an opinion, everyone wanted a glimpse.

Yuri took a sharp, unplanned turn into the bathroom and claimed the stall furthest from the door. Attention had never used to bother him; he skated in glittery outfits in front of hundreds of people, for heaven's sake. Eyes were on him ever since he entered the sport professionally, with a few years on top of that from before. He used to relish the spotlight, search for it, try to hold it for as long as he could. And where was he now? 

In a bathroom, sitting on the toilet seat with his pants down even though he didn't need to use it, gripping his phone because Viktor had warned him about digging his nails into his legs too hard, struggling to inhale properly. He wanted to call his dyedushka Kolya, have his reassuring voice soothe his nerves, tell him he'd be brilliant no matter what marks the judges awarded him.

His finger pressed call before he could think twice about it, and the phone rang. And rang. And rang. Yuri rested his head on the stall door in front of him, his shallow breaths misting up the wood for a split second each time.

"Yurochka?"

Yuri exhaled deeply, his eyes closing.

"Hi."

A silent heartbeat.

"Why are you calling?" 

The cold tone plunged like a knife into Yuri's chest. He didn't know what to say. _I wish you were here with me. I've missed you. Are you doing okay?_

"Are you watching?"

A sigh. 

"Yes."

"Will you be rooting for me?"

"Is that why you called? Is that why you came knocking on my door in February?"

_No. That was because I missed you, because I'm anxious because I want you to help and support me like you used to. Because I hope you still care but I'm not sure you do, and it hurts._

"I just want to know if you're okay."

"I'm fine. Are you still going out with boys?"

Yuri swallowed. The whispered _yes_ seemed to resonate hundredfold.

"Then we're done talking."

And then there was silence. Yuri carried on leaning on the door for a minute or ten. Oddly, there wasn't a single cohesive thought in his head, only some vague question and exclamation marks clashing over each other. He blinked his eyes open when he heard a scuffle and then there were dark green shoe tips visible in the gap below the door.

"Yuri?"

Phichit's voice.

"Are you okay?"

Yuri stayed silent, barely breathing. Eventually, Phichit went away.

Later, Yuri barely remembered stepping into the rink. He recalled bright lights, the audience clapping, the worry in Viktor's eyes and the pensive look on Phichit's face. He skated in tandem with the music, he knew that much. He didn't fall, but he wasn't sure if he remembered all his jumps. There was a tight feeling in his chest that made him breathe faster, small, painful bursts of air that helped the frost cover his lungs. About halfway through, he doubted he'd be able to finish, his cells screaming for more oxygen, but his feet kept pushing forward, one step at a time, a gesture here, a spin there, pull his leg up, let it go, bend backwards, straighten up and up and _up_, and then it was over and it felt like Yuri took the first breath of his life.

The lights were bright, the audience clapping. Viktor was smiling proudly, and Yuri thought, _that's it_.

The flight back to St Petersburg seemed out of place. There was a bronze medal carefully tucked away in Yuri's backpack and his fingers seemed unable to stop reaching for it.

"If you touch it any more, you'll smooth out the engravings," Viktor mumbled from the next seat. He had been in a somewhat emotional state for the past twenty-four hours, in one moment wearing a soft smile, the next turning his glassy eyes away. Yuri didn't know what to do with him when he couldn't even figure out what to do with himself. 

Stepping on the podium had been surreal, and hanging his head low to receive the medal even more so. With the combined score of 273.73, he had just narrowly missed silver, but he couldn't care less. Half a year ago, he might have sneered at the idea of finishing in the third place. Three months ago, he would have sneered at the idea of him skating at the World Championship. And yet, here he sat, with a bronze medal from the World Championship in his backpack. 

Life was good. 

In a few hours, he would jump headfirst into his bed at Yakov's flat and scroll through his Instagram to like all of Phichit's gold-medal selfies. At the post-competition banquet, Phichit had approached him. They were not together, goodness no, but they had agreed to keep in touch, to see each other out of season to figure out what it was that they could have. A chance had been all that Yuri wanted, and a chance had been what he got.

His dyedushka... well, he couldn't really change the man's mind. Kolya was many things, and true to his beliefs was one of them. There were many memories to treasure from the time before Yuri had told him, and Yuri decided that was what mattered to him. The rejection hurt, of course it did - he doubted it would ever stop - but if the past months taught him anything, it was that looking at your past and cherry-picking only the worst could drive you mad. Instead, he chose to remember the kitten and the holidays and his dyedushka standing at the edge of the rink, clapping his hands off.

"Seriously, though, leave the medal be for a moment," Viktor said, cutting through the haze. Looking down, Yuri realised he was holding it again, thumbs painting circles across its surface. It was technically just a lump of metal, but it felt like a testament to all the hurdles and marathons that he had weathered and it was hard to let go. He still didn't believe it.

"Yeah," he mumbled, putting it back into its box and inside the bag nevertheless. Then it occurred to him.

"Are you going to stay?"

Viktor looked as if Yuri caught him doing something unbecoming.

"Well, I'm not really needed anymore, am I?" Viktor scratched his shoulder. "I did what I was supposed to do. You seem much better, and I think you're much better. I wanted to go back to Moskva to work and keep an eye on you from there."

"Oh."

"Why? Would you miss me?" Viktor's tone was teasing, the exact opposite of Yuri's straight-forward, serious, "Yes."

Viktor's features melted into a smile. 

"You know, I'm really glad I got to meet you," Viktor said while Yuri stared on the seat in front of him. "And I'm really glad I got to be the one to help you on this journey. I don't know if you realise just how important it was to me that you get better."

"Because I'm another you?"

"You might be a good skater, but you're no me." Viktor laughed when Yuri scoffed. "I just didn't want another talented person to give up and run away. I did that, and I regretted it. Even though I would've never met Christophe, never went to university, never lived a normal person's life if I had stayed, I still kept thinking of what could have been. It drove me crazy."

Yuri kept quiet while Viktor sighed, his whole body relaxing into the seat.

"But I think experiencing your tour de self-discovery," Yuri elbowed him this time, "_ow_ \- made me realise that what I've got is equally precious. It's different, but worth having just the same."

There was a beat of silence.

"I should've known you'd get all deep on me," Yuri said, grinning as Viktor shook his head in exasperation. "How long 'til you leave?"

"I don't know. I'll send an email to the practice and see what they have to say, but it'll probably take a few months at least."

"Okay," Yuri said. "Let's have that late birthday party then."

"I knew it bothered you that we forgot!" Viktor grinned victoriously. "I'll let Christophe know. He was never one to miss an opportunity to show off his planning skills."

Half smiling, half wondering what he had gotten himself into, Yuri turned to the window and watched the cities flit by, feeling, well, not happy, but good; proud of what he had achieved on the rink and off it, content with the life he was returning to - and excited to see what the world had in store for him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand it's done! After approximately 763 years, I can cross this out of the to-finish fan fic list. Thank you for reading and if you have any feedback - please me let me know. Improving is important and all that xx

**Author's Note:**

> Next part coming next week. Please leave feedback, it helps a lot!  
Find me on [tumblr](http://www.larryhaylik.tumblr.com).


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